On May 5, a senior executive of a Shanghai-based corporation suffered a sudden cardiac arrest and passed away while running a desert marathon held in Guazhou of Gansu Province, according to Chinese social media Weibo. Just within the first week of this month, two other separate marathon deaths were reported. Liang Jing, a well-known runner who had won a 62-mile race in Ningbo, and Huang Guanjun, the marathon champion for hearing-impaired runners at China’s 2019 National Paralympic Games, were among those who died.

The 100-kilometer (62-mile) mountain race was being held on May 22 in the Yellow River Stone Forest tourist site of Baiyin city in Gansu Province, when it was hit by hail, freezing rain, and gale-force winds that caused as many as 21 deaths out of a total of 172 participants.