A mechanic was thrown 10 meters onto a canopy roof when a burst of air suddenly shot from the enormous tire he was inflating on Friday.

Wang Bing was treated for a broken right leg in Mianzhu, Sichuan Province after firefighters discovered him on the roof with his pants completely shredded from the impact of the concentrated air blast from the tire's valve stem.

"I heard a huge 'bang' and saw him fly from the tire," said one witness. "Then there was another 'bang' when he hit the third-floor canopy." 

"This is the first time I've ever seen someone thrown by a tire like that in my 10 years on the job," said Li Kang, a colleague of Wang at the shovel loader maintenance garage.

Firefighters suspected a defect on the rim or the tire was incorrectly mounted.

The average shovel loader tire starts around 1.25 meters in diameter and has a pressure of 500 kilopascals (or 73 pounds-per-square-inch).

West China Metropolis Daily