A 26-year-old from a rural corner of Hubei province has gone viral after flying a hoverboard he built himself over mountains, city streets and the Yangtze River — and then landing safely in a canyon.
Song Xingyu, known online as "Amazing Ayu," completed the test flight in his hometown of Enshi during China's National Day holiday in October, then posted the footage on Oct 15. The timing was pointed: Tesla debuted its redesigned Roadster the same day, complete with a ramp jump over parked cars. Chinese commenters had a field day, one quipping that Tesla built a giant flying toy for show while "we Chinese can actually fly." The Douyin clip has since racked up more than 5.1 million likes, with plenty of viewers initially convinced it must be AI-generated.
The backstory is almost as dramatic as the flight. Song left school at 14 to work in his father's lumberyard, got hooked on aviation after watching a flight-testing show, and started building model aircraft from scrap with donations from online enthusiasts. In 2022 he took out loans to convert an abandoned shed into a workshop — a move that eventually left him 2.4 million yuan (about US$360,000) in debt after a scam, before camera maker Insta360 stepped in with 1.8 million yuan of funding.
His earlier projects read like a stunt reel with a worrying safety record. A helium-balloon launch of a remote-controlled plane was wrecked by storms. A helicopter jump from 5,000 metres in a homemade jet-powered suit saw his main parachute fail, with the backup only deploying 600 metres above the ground — hours after he recorded a last will telling people not to copy him. Less dangerously, he once lifted a furnished living room by hot-air balloon and fried eggs in it mid-air.
The hoverboard itself went through iterations. A first version powered by micro turbojet engines caught fire during testing, so he switched to electric propulsion. The finished board uses AI-based monitoring, can reportedly carry four adults, and required weeks of balance training. Song has now turned down media appearances and commercial deals to keep working on getting it to fly higher, and some online have suggested the technology could eventually serve search-and-rescue operations.
Why should a traveller care? Partly because it's a genuinely striking story out of a region most visitors skip — Enshi in Hubei is known for its dramatic canyon and karst scenery, which is exactly the terrain Song flew over. Mostly, though, it's a reminder that China's homegrown tech-creator scene keeps producing spectacles that rival anything Silicon Valley stages. Worth a follow even if you're never boarding a hoverboard yourself.
Reporting: Bangkok Post Life
