Road collapse survivor travels 800 km to thank 64-year-old who stopped cars from falling into pit

A person's gratefulness can be seen in the way they treat others. Cai Xuanda, a man in China, traveled 800km to thank an elderly who saved him from driving into a collapsed road. This incident happened on May 1, Wednesday, when an 18-meter-long section of the road in a mountainous area of Guangdong collapsed. It left 48 people dead and 30 injured, reports South China Morning Post.

64-year-old Huang Jiandu had just crossed the collapsed section of the road. When he saw a massive hole behind his car, he decided to stay and inform the people coming from behind. For that first, he crossed onto the other side of the hole and started yelling at the cars coming by. Unfortunately, many people ignored him and fell into the pit. So, Jiandu decided to kneel in the middle of the road to stop the cars. That way, people halted their cars. The second car that Jiandu stopped was Xuanda's which was about 20 meters away from the pit. 

Jiandu saved many lives that day, but it was Xuanda and his family, who decided to meet him and thank him in person. His father said, "If brother Huang had not got down on his knees, my son wouldn't have stopped." The family went to Jiandu's house in Shenzhen, driving from their hometown in Zhangzhou, which took an entire day. Xuanda's mother asked her son to bow "in earnest" towards the elderly man to thank him. The family also gave Jiandu a bouquet and a silk banner on which it was written in Chinese, "You risked your own life to save my life, your kindness is as heavy as a mountain." 

The young man was driving at a speed of 100 km/hr that day and had to slam his brakes to stop. He recalled that once he got out of the car, he could see a big hole in the road and also saw some cars on fire. He used his phone's torch and saw the slippery slope and shaking ground. After understanding the situation, the young man along with another driver saved four people from the cars in the pit, including a three-year-old kid. Xuanda said, "As a retired PLA soldier and a person who was grateful to have been rescued, I saw it is my mission and responsibility to save others." However, Jiandu was called a hero following the incident by the media. He also got calls from strangers applauding what he did. He told them, "If you were in that scenario, you would have done the same."