A 62-year-old man named Fan, drove an SUV into a crowd outside a sports hall in Zhuhai, a southern coastal city, on November 11. The incident occurred at 7:48 p.m. when Fan rammed the vehicle into people exercising around the track at the Zhuhai Sports Centre, resulting in the tragic deaths of at least 35 people. This is one of the country’s most violent attacks in recent years.

Late on November 11, Zhuhai police issued a brief statement stating that the man was apprehended while attempting to escape after colliding with numerous persons. On November 12, the police released a fuller statement, stating that 35 people had died and 43 had been injured. He started to mutilate himself with a knife after the cops prevented him from driving away, and he passed out after slitting his own throat. According to the police statement, he is receiving emergency care and cannot be questioned.

The police reported that Fan’s attack was driven by his unhappiness with how marital assets were divided following his divorce. President Xi Jinping has directed authorities to make every effort to treat those injured and to ensure the perpetrator faces strict legal punishment, according to the Xinhua news agency. According to Xinhua, President Xi has encouraged all relevant authorities to "draw lessons from the case, to strengthen their prevention and control of risks at the source," and the central government has dispatched a team to supervise the matter's treatment.

The attack took place just before China’s largest bi-annual air show in Zhuhai, an event that has been held since 1996. Over 1,000 companies from nearly 50 countries have come together for this major showcase. China has experienced several stabbing incidents recently. In September, a 10-year-old Japanese student was killed by a 44-year-old man outside his school in Shenzhen. In June, a man attacked a Japanese mother and her three-year-old son in Suzhou, leading to the death of a Chinese bus attendant who tried to help. Just last month, a 50-year-old man injured five people, including three children, in a knife attack outside a primary school in Beijing.

Wei Qingjie, 28, lives in Zhuhai and grew up across the street from the stadium where she used to play as a child. She knows people who were slightly injured in the attack. "I don't know what he had gone through, to have had the kind of emotion to do this sort of thing and hurt so many families," she added of the offender. “The number of casualties is too high,” she said. “It’s very sad.”