A woman in Tainan was saved by iPhone digital assistant Siri after almost strangling herself while practicing aerial yoga on Thursday.
The 34-year-old woman, surnamed Shih (石), was practicing aerial yoga alone, when the silks twined around her neck and left her hanging in the air, she told police.
She told Siri to call the police, as she could not untie the strings and had difficulty breathing.
Photo courtesy of a reader
Police and firefighters arrived at the site of the incident, broke open the door and cut the silks around Shih’s neck.
Although Shih was found to have no life-threatening injuries after an initial examination by paramedics, she went to a hospital with her husband for further inspection and therapy, as she was shaken by the incident, police said.
Shih and her husband later expressed gratitude for the police’s prompt response and professional handling of the matter.
The Tainan City Police Department’s Second Precinct warned the public of the risks while doing sports, saying that one should be accompanied by others or under professional instructions when doing sports with auxiliary means, such as aerial yoga, to ensure safety.
Aerial yoga, also known as anti-gravity yoga, is a sport using strings and silks to lift one’s body and perform upside-down movements and stretches in the air, allowing more challenging poses than those in traditional yoga.
An aerial yoga teacher with six years of teaching experience was quoted by the China Times as saying that one should practice aerial yoga at places that are certified to install silk hammocks.
If aerial yoga is performed at home, the hammocks and other equipment should be periodically examined, maintained and replaced, the teacher was quoted as saying.
Improper postures or excessive force in aerial yoga could lead to injuries in the neck, shoulder, back or hip, while wrong movements could easily result in the practitioner tangled up and trapped in the air, the teacher was quoted as saying, adding that it is advisable to practice aerial yoga with a partner.
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