Probe into acrobat's death finalized

Authorities in Anhui province have finalized their investigation and will soon call related people to account for the accidental death of an acrobat during a performance in Suzhou on Saturday night, according to a statement from the local government on Tuesday.

A female acrobat, surnamed Sun, fell onto the stage during a flying trapeze performance while performing with her husband and eventually died from her injuries, Suzhou city's Yongqiao district government information office said on Sunday.

Anhui Yaxi Performing and Media Company, which hired the couple, illegally conducted the performance without reporting it beforehand to the local authorities, which took place on a farm in the district's Haogou township, according to the office's Tuesday statement.

The operator of the farm, surnamed Yin, signed an agreement with the company at the end of March. They scheduled performances from Saturday to Sunday in the township's Yinlou village, but they were immediately suspended after the accident, according to the statement.

The local government will handle the company's irregular conduct according to the country's Regulations on the Administration of Commercial Performances, the statement said.

It vowed to punish the township's related departments and officials for their failure to fulfill their supervision and promised to strengthen the administration in Yongqiao's performance market.

The investigation team consisted of the district's police and tourism authorities, who arrived at the site after the accident and found that the performance had been conducted without the necessary safety measures in place, and that the organizers did not operate a crane to lift the acrobats correctly.

Previous media reports said Sun fell from about 10 meters above the stage, while Hu Jun, an experienced acrobat in Anhui, told China Daily that such performances only need to be 4 to 5 meters above the ground.

Having been engaged in the flying trapeze for decades, Hu said he was shocked by the accident after watching videos of it online.

"Though the performance is deemed dangerous by the audience, such fatal accidents are rare because performers are usually very experienced with years of strict training and a professional team behind them," said Hu.

The performance company has reached a compensation agreement with the victim's family.