Knife falls from balcony into Chinese man's head

A pedestrian in China has lived to tell the tale after a knife fell from an eighth-storey balcony and plunged into his head.

Yunzhi Xiao, 57, told NBC News he was walking to a supermarket in Guangyuan, Sichuan Province, last Thursday when he felt a "very heavy weight" on his head.

A 12cm kitchen knife left in a balcony flowerpot was knocked over the ledge by the wind and struck Xiao, embedding itself up its hilt in the left side of his head, but without piercing his skull.

"I cried out, 'My head! My head hurts!' but I did not know what had happened," Xiao told NBC News from his hospital bed.

A local tobacconist shouted out to Xiao that there was a knife in his head and he managed to walk a little further to a phone booth where he sat down.

Passersby called police and Xiao was taken to a local hospital, where doctors managed to remove the knife.

On Monday, Mr Xiao was still being treated in his local intensive care unit.

The knife's owner has also since visited Xiao in hospital and apologised.

Photos of Xiao looking unflustered in hospital with the knife sticking out of his head have spread around Chinese social media circles and earned him the nickname "Calm Brother".