On the night of July 7, 2010, Hangzhou Xiaoshan International Airport in Zhejiang Province, China was closed for approximately one hour after air-traffic controllers and pilots reported a glowing unidentified object in the airspace above the runway. The incident began at 8:40 PM local time when inbound crews aboard Shanghai–Hangzhou service flights reported a 'bright comet-like object' climbing vertically in the approach corridor. Within minutes, radar operators at Xiaoshan confirmed a stationary contact at an estimated altitude of 8,500 metres approximately four kilometres south-southeast of the airport. The object was simultaneously reported by drivers on the nearby G92 expressway.
Xiaoshan authorities grounded departing traffic and diverted arrivals to Shanghai Hongqiao and Pudong airports beginning at 8:55 PM. Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) controllers requested identification from both the People's Liberation Army Air Force's East Sea Fleet air wing and the Shanghai Air Defense Region; both confirmed no military activity in the sector. At 9:15 PM, airport security posted video of the object from the ground, showing what appeared to be a horizontal row of pulsing lights beneath a dark elongated shape. The video became one of the most-viewed UFO recordings in Chinese history, receiving more than 30 million views within 48 hours on Youku and Sina Weibo.
The object departed northward at 9:40 PM and the airport reopened to traffic at 10:15 PM. Eighteen flights were delayed and three diverted. Chinese authorities released no formal investigation findings. An anonymous statement from 'a source familiar with the matter' published in the state-owned Zhejiang Daily claimed the object was linked to unannounced military testing, but this was contradicted by the PLAAF's on-the-night denials. Independent Chinese UFO researcher Zhang Jingping of the Beijing UFO Research Society has formally registered the Hangzhou incident as the most significant multi-witness airport-closure UFO event in modern Chinese history. The video and the ATC transcripts remain publicly available and the incident has been covered in English-language media including CNN and the BBC.