On 7 July, the Olympic Torch Relay apparently went off without a hitch, but it was a bad day for trees in Lanzhou.
Firstly, the driver of the #71 bus decided to swerve onto the pavement outside the Xiguan Mosque, opposite our apartment block (directly behind the bus in the photo). It collided with a concrete telegraph pole (taking out electricity in much of the area for the rest of the day), which in turn toppled over, taking the tops off a couple of unlucky trees:
Then later on, the clear sky of a perfect summer's evening turned dark, signalling a storm. It only lasted a short time, but it brought a violent hailstorm, which smashed windows in houses, and gale-force winds, bringing down more trees. The picture below shows one of three trees that came down in one street alone:
Sources
Bus crash photo: Lanzhou Evening Post
Storm photos: Lanzhou Evening Post