Show-off builder spears manhood with 7ft steel bar after falling off a pole

China: Wu Hsing was trying to impress pals during his lunch hour by jumping across beams on the building site

A show-off builder pierced his genitals with a 7ft metal bar after trying to leap across scaffolding to impress his workmates.

Wu Hsing, 40, had been showing off in front of work pals during a lunch break by jumping across beams.

But as he leapt from one to the other, boasting he could have been a circus trapeze artist, he slipped, plunging over six feet to the ground and landing crotch-first on the 7-foot steel rod.

The unfortunate incident occurred at a building site in the city of Zhangzhou in south-eastern China’s Fujian province.

Work pal Cheng Ni, 38, said: "He was showing off his balancing skills and was doing a pretty good job until he missed his footing and slipped.

"When he landed, he let out a howl of such pain I thought the steel rod had gone right inside. Mind you what had happened was bad enough.

"I looked down and saw him sitting on the ground with this huge pole sticking out of his trousers.

"There was a lot of blood and he was very pale, sitting and staring at it."

When an ambulance arrived, paramedics sawed off the top and bottom of the steel rod before rushing Wu to hospital where surgeons were able to remove the rest.

A hospital spokesman said: "It was a very tricky operation as the rod had mangled his genital area and we had to make sure we didn’t make the situation worse.

"It is too early to say if he will regain use of his reproductive organs but in the first instance he is incredibly lucky that the bar only penetrated there and didn’t go through his body, or pierce his neck.

"It was long enough that it could have come out through his head."

The man is now recovering in hospital.