{"id":20886500,"date":"2026-09-07T13:44:55","date_gmt":"2026-09-07T11:44:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/migflug.com\/afterburner\/feng-ru-first-chinese-aviator-oakland-1909\/"},"modified":"2026-09-07T13:45:26","modified_gmt":"2026-09-07T11:45:26","slug":"feng-ru-first-chinese-aviator-oakland-1909","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/migflug.com\/afterburner\/it\/feng-ru-first-chinese-aviator-oakland-1909\/","title":{"rendered":"Feng Ru: The Man Who Built China&#8217;s First Aeroplane in Oakland"},"content":{"rendered":"<style>.et_pb_title_container h1.entry-title { padding-top: 40px !important; }<\/style>\r\n\r\n<p>On a Tuesday evening in September 1909, in the hills behind Piedmont, California, a Chinese machinist took off in a biplane he had designed, built and powered with an engine he had also built, and flew an elliptical circuit around a hilltop for about twenty minutes into a strong wind.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>He came down when the bolt holding the propeller to the shaft sheared. The aeroplane dropped tail-first. He was bruised.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>Three years later, in front of a thousand people outside Guangzhou, he pulled up too steeply and did not survive it.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background:#f5f5f5;padding:20px 24px;margin:26px 0;border-left:4px solid #5C91FF\"><p style=\"margin:0 0 10px;font-weight:700;font-size:17px\">Quick Facts &mdash; Feng Ru (&#20911;&#22914;)<\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><strong>Born:<\/strong> 1883 or January 1884, Enping county, Guangdong<\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><strong>Emigrated to the United States:<\/strong> aged about twelve, in the mid-1890s<\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><strong>Company:<\/strong> Guangdong Air Vehicle Company, Oakland, founded 1908&ndash;09<\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><strong>First flight:<\/strong> 21 September 1909, hills behind Piedmont, California<\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><strong>Aircraft:<\/strong> Biplane, both wings 25 ft span with a 6 ft 3 in chord<\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><strong>Engine:<\/strong> 6 hp, of his own construction<\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><strong>Flight:<\/strong> About 20 minutes, never more than 10&ndash;12 ft high<\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><strong>Returned to China:<\/strong> Arrived Hong Kong 21 March 1911<\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><strong>Died:<\/strong> 25 August 1912 (Western sources say 26 August), Yantang, Guangzhou<\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><strong>Buried:<\/strong> Huanghuagang Mausoleum of the 72 Martyrs, Guangzhou<\/p><\/div>\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">Seven Years in the Shipyards<\/h2>\r\n\r\n<p>He was born into a poor farming family in Enping, Guangdong, the youngest of several children, three of whom had already died. He went to America at about twelve with a maternal uncle.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>Then came seven years in New York-area shipyards, power plants and machine shops, working as an apprentice and a labourer while teaching himself English and mechanics. He built pumps, pile-drivers, generators and wireless sets. He came back to San Francisco in 1906 to run a machine business, and the earthquake pushed him across the bay to Oakland.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background:#f8f9fa;border-left:4px solid #1565c0;padding:20px 22px;margin:18px 0 24px;font-size:16px;line-height:1.7;display:flex;gap:20px;align-items:flex-start\"><div><em>&ldquo;He was staggered by America&rsquo;s power and prosperity. He understood that industrialization made the country great, and felt that industrialization could do the same for China.&rdquo;<\/em><div style=\"margin-top:10px;font-size:14px;color:#555\"><strong>Patti Gully<\/strong> &mdash; aviation historian, to Smithsonian&rsquo;s Air &amp; Space magazine<\/div><\/div><\/div>\r\n<p>His first workshop was a shack ten feet by eight. He rarely stopped work before three in the morning. Chinese businessmen in Oakland backed him &mdash; one contemporary account has three of them putting up $750 between them &mdash; and a restaurant keeper from Ninth Street helped him assemble the aircraft.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>He had the engine castings made by different machine shops on the East Coast and assembled them himself, so that nobody could work out the design. Guards were posted round the field.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\" style=\"margin:0 0 24px;width:100%\"><img data-opt-id=996607011  fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"skip-lazy\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" loading=\"eager\" width=\"1024\" src=\"https:\/\/ml5psubhxdln.i.optimole.com\/cb:FMt9.d117\/w:auto\/h:auto\/q:mauto\/ig:avif\/https:\/\/migflug.com\/afterburner\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2026\/09\/san-francisco-call-1911-feng-ru-fung-joe-guey.jpg\" alt=\"A 1911 San Francisco Call feature about Feng Ru, headlined &ldquo;He Will Fit Wings to the Chinese Dragon&rdquo;\" style=\"width:100%;height:auto;max-width:100%;display:block\"><figcaption style=\"font-size:13px;color:#777;text-align:center;margin-top:6px;font-style:italic\">&ldquo;He Will Fit Wings to the Chinese Dragon&rdquo; &mdash; the San Francisco Call, 19 March 1911. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">Twenty Minutes at Twelve Feet<\/h2>\r\n\r\n<p>The <em>Oakland Enquirer<\/em> of 23 September 1909 reported that he had flown on Tuesday &mdash; which was the 21st &mdash; at about six in the evening. The subhead read: MOTOR AND AEROPLANE ARE OF HIS OWN BUILD.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background:#f8f9fa;border-left:4px solid #5C91FF;padding:20px 22px;margin:18px 0 24px;font-size:16px;line-height:1.7;display:flex;gap:20px;align-items:flex-start\"><div><em>&ldquo;The big bi-plane, with its four starting wheels tucked beneath it like the talons of a bird, sailed slowly in an elliptical course around the crest of the hill nearly back to the starting point.&rdquo;<\/em><div style=\"margin-top:10px;font-size:14px;color:#555\"><strong>The Oakland Enquirer<\/strong> &mdash; 23 September 1909<\/div><\/div><\/div>\r\n<p>Two details are worth correcting, because they have propagated. The aircraft is often described as a sesquiplane with a 25-foot upper wing and a 6 ft 3 in lower one. The primary source actually says two planes, each 25 feet long and 6 feet 3 inches broad, one above the other &mdash; span and chord, not two different spans. It was a conventional biplane.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>And the date. Chinese commemorations use 22 September, but the newspaper says Tuesday, and 22 September 1909 was a Wednesday. The 21st is the better-evidenced date.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>The witnesses were his three Chinese helpers, a young disciple and a few local farmers.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">The First Flight in California?<\/h2>\r\n\r\n<p>The <em>Enquirer<\/em>&rsquo;s second story that day was headlined CHINESE AVIATOR FIRST TO FLY ON COAST, and no earlier powered flight in California has surfaced to contradict it. The first American air meet, at Dominguez Field near Los Angeles, was in January 1910 &mdash; four months later.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>The claim needs one qualifier, though. John J. Montgomery had been flying gliders at Otay Mesa as far back as 1883, and balloon-launched gliders at Santa Clara in 1905. Those are heavier-than-air flights, and they came first.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>So the defensible statement is the first recorded <em>powered<\/em> aeroplane flight in California, and on the American West Coast. Which is still remarkable, and was achieved by a man who had arrived as a twelve-year-old immigrant labourer.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>Not everyone in America found it charming. One newspaper account of the period, quoted by Smithsonian, caught the mood exactly.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background:#f8f9fa;border-left:4px solid #d32f2f;padding:20px 22px;margin:18px 0 24px;font-size:16px;line-height:1.7;display:flex;gap:20px;align-items:flex-start\"><div><em>&ldquo;Immigration officials and customs inspectors are today said to be gnashing their teeth. They find it hard enough to keep the Chinese out now, without having them dropping in on flying machines.&rdquo;<\/em><div style=\"margin-top:10px;font-size:14px;color:#555\"><strong>The Oregonian<\/strong> &mdash; quoted by Smithsonian&rsquo;s Air &amp; Space magazine<\/div><\/div><\/div>\r\n\r\n<div style=\"position:relative;padding-bottom:56.25%;height:0;overflow:hidden;margin:24px 0\"><iframe class=\"skip-lazy\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" loading=\"eager\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/R5a0c8iMAns\" style=\"position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;border:0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\r\n<p>An English-language summary of Feng Ru&rsquo;s career.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">Going Home<\/h2>\r\n\r\n<p>Sun Yat-sen asked him to come back. He sailed on the SS <em>China<\/em> in February 1911 with six countrymen from Oakland and a biplane of his own construction, twenty-nine and a half feet long, and reached Hong Kong on 21 March 1911.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background:#f8f9fa;border-left:4px solid #1565c0;padding:20px 22px;margin:18px 0 24px;font-size:16px;line-height:1.7;display:flex;gap:20px;align-items:flex-start\"><div><em>&ldquo;[Feng] will leave here for his native land to-morrow, taking with him a biplane of the Curtiss type, in which he intends to make exhibition flights. It is believed that he will be the first aviator to rise from the ground in China&hellip;. The machine he is taking to China is of his own construction.&rdquo;<\/em><div style=\"margin-top:10px;font-size:14px;color:#555\"><strong>The New York Times<\/strong> &mdash; 21 February 1911<\/div><\/div><\/div>\r\n<p>In Guangzhou the firm was renamed the Guangdong Aircraft Company with Feng as chief engineer. After the revolution of November 1911 the Guangdong revolutionary government made him its chief of aviation. In March 1912 he completed an aircraft similar to his Feng Ru No. 2 &mdash; the first aeroplane built in China.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<h2 style=\"padding-top:22px\">Yantang, 25 August 1912<\/h2>\r\n\r\n<p>He was flying an exhibition at the Yantang parade ground outside Guangzhou, in front of about a thousand people. He climbed to something like thirty-six metres, flew perhaps eight kilometres south-east, pulled up too steeply, stalled and went in.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>He died of his injuries in hospital. He was twenty-nine.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>He was given a military funeral and a posthumous rank of major general, and buried at the Huanghuagang mausoleum among the martyrs of the 1911 revolution. The tomb inscription names him as a pioneer of Chinese aviation. His reported last words &mdash; that his death should not check his colleagues&rsquo; spirit of enterprise, because this was a stage that had to be passed &mdash; are widely quoted but rest on second-hand accounts, so are best given as reported rather than documented.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\" style=\"margin:0 0 24px;width:100%\"><img data-opt-id=1417033526  fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"skip-lazy\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" loading=\"eager\" width=\"1024\" src=\"https:\/\/ml5psubhxdln.i.optimole.com\/cb:FMt9.d117\/w:auto\/h:auto\/q:mauto\/ig:avif\/https:\/\/migflug.com\/afterburner\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2026\/09\/feng-ru-tomb-huanghuagang-guangzhou.jpg\" alt=\"Feng Ru&rsquo;s tomb at the Huanghuagang Mausoleum of the 72 Martyrs in Guangzhou\" style=\"width:100%;height:auto;max-width:100%;display:block\"><figcaption style=\"font-size:13px;color:#777;text-align:center;margin-top:6px;font-style:italic\">Feng Ru&rsquo;s tomb at Huanghuagang, Guangzhou. Listed as a municipal cultural relic in 1983. Photo: &#21476;&#28023;&#23736;&#36951;&#22336;, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\r\n<p>What survives of him is scattered. A memorial meeting was held at the crash site a month after his death; a monument went up there in 1988. A bust stands at Beihang University in Beijing, inscribed with a line attributed to him about the aeroplane being the supreme weapon of war and his vow to master it or die trying. A replica of the Feng Ru No. 2 is at the China Aviation Museum.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<p>And on 21 September 2009, a hundred years after the flight, a bronze bust of him was unveiled at Laney College in Oakland &mdash; on ground where one of his workshops had stood.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n<div style=\"position:relative;padding-bottom:56.25%;height:0;overflow:hidden;margin:24px 0\"><iframe class=\"skip-lazy\" data-no-lazy=\"1\" loading=\"eager\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/Q_T7aVK16ec\" style=\"position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;border:0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\r\n<p>A Chinese television documentary on Feng Ru.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n<div style=\"display:flex;justify-content:center;margin:2em 0\"><blockquote class=\"reddit-embed-bq\" data-embed-height=\"500\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/aviation\/comments\/bfgtth\/the_father_of_chinese_aviation_feng_ru_made\/\">The father of Chinese aviation, Feng Ru<\/a><\/blockquote><script async src=\"https:\/\/embed.reddit.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/div>\r\n\r\n<style>.mfq{margin:34px 0 8px}.mfq h2{font:26px\/1.3 \"Gilroy semiBold\",Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;color:#0d1117;padding-top:22px;margin:0 0 6px}.mfq .qa details{border-top:1px solid #5C91FF;margin:0;padding:0}.mfq .qa details:last-of-type{border-bottom:1px solid #e2e7ee}.mfq .qa summary{cursor:pointer;list-style:none;display:flex;justify-content:space-between;align-items:center;gap:16px;padding:22px 26px;font:18px\/1.7 \"Gilroy semiBold\",Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;color:#0d1117}.mfq .qa summary::-webkit-details-marker{display:none}.mfq .qa summary::after{content:\"+\";font:24px Helvetica,sans-serif;color:#3568e0;flex:0 0 auto}.mfq .qa details[open] summary::after{content:\"\\2013\"}.mfq .qa details:hover summary{color:#3568e0}.mfq .qa .a{font:16px\/1.7 \"Gilroy regular\",Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;color:#454e5e;padding:0 26px 24px}.mfq .qa .a a{color:#3568e0}@media(max-width:680px){.mfq .qa summary{padding:18px 14px;font-size:17px}.mfq .qa .a{padding:0 14px 20px}}<\/style>\r\n\r\n\r\n<section class=\"mfq\"><h2>Frequently Asked Questions<\/h2><div class=\"qa\"><details open><summary>Who was Feng Ru?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">Feng Ru (&#20911;&#22914;), known in the American press as Fung Joe Guey, was a Chinese-born machinist and aviation pioneer who emigrated to the United States as a child, taught himself engineering in East Coast shipyards and machine shops, and built both an aeroplane and its engine in Oakland, California. On 21 September 1909 he made what is recorded as the first powered aeroplane flight in California. He is honoured in China as the father of Chinese aviation.<\/div><\/details><details><summary>When exactly did Feng Ru make his first flight?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">The Oakland Enquirer of 23 September 1909 reported that he had flown on the Tuesday, which was 21 September. Chinese commemorations generally use 22 September, but 22 September 1909 was a Wednesday, so the 21st is the better-evidenced date. He flew for about twenty minutes in an elliptical circuit around a hilltop behind Piedmont, never more than ten to twelve feet up, ending when the bolt holding the propeller to the shaft sheared.<\/div><\/details><details><summary>Was Feng Ru really the first person to fly in California?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">The defensible claim is the first recorded powered aeroplane flight in California and on the US West Coast &mdash; which is what the contemporary Oakland Enquirer asserted, and the first American air meet at Dominguez Field followed four months later in January 1910. It was not the first heavier-than-air flight in the state: John J. Montgomery flew gliders at Otay Mesa in 1883 and balloon-launched gliders at Santa Clara in 1905.<\/div><\/details><details><summary>Did Feng Ru build his own engine?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">Yes. The Oakland Enquirer of 23 September 1909 records that the aircraft was driven by a six-horsepower engine of his own construction, under a subhead reading &ldquo;Motor and Aeroplane Are of His Own Build&rdquo;. He had the castings made by different machine shops on the East Coast and assembled them himself, so that no single shop could work out the design.<\/div><\/details><details><summary>How did Feng Ru die?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">He was killed flying an exhibition at the Yantang parade ground near Guangzhou in front of around a thousand spectators. He climbed to roughly thirty-six metres, flew some eight kilometres, pulled up too steeply, stalled and crashed, dying of his injuries in hospital aged 29. Chinese sources and the 1988 memorial stele date this to 25 August 1912; most Western accounts say 26 August.<\/div><\/details><details><summary>Where is Feng Ru buried?<\/summary><div class=\"a\">At the Huanghuagang Mausoleum of the 72 Martyrs in Guangzhou, among the dead of the 1911 revolution, with an inscription naming him a pioneer of Chinese aviation. His tomb was listed as a Guangzhou municipal cultural relic in 1983. A monument also stands at the crash site, erected in 1988, and a bronze bust was unveiled at Laney College in Oakland on 21 September 2009, on ground where one of his workshops had stood.<\/div><\/details><\/div><\/section>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@type\":\"FAQPage\",\"mainEntity\":[{\"@type\":\"Question\",\"name\":\"Who was Feng Ru?\",\"acceptedAnswer\":{\"@type\":\"Answer\",\"text\":\"Feng Ru (&#20911;&#22914;), known in the American press as Fung Joe Guey, was a Chinese-born machinist and aviation pioneer who emigrated to the United States as a child, taught himself engineering in East Coast shipyards and machine shops, and built both an aeroplane and its engine in Oakland, California. On 21 September 1909 he made what is recorded as the first powered aeroplane flight in California. He is honoured in China as the father of Chinese aviation.\"}},{\"@type\":\"Question\",\"name\":\"When exactly did Feng Ru make his first flight?\",\"acceptedAnswer\":{\"@type\":\"Answer\",\"text\":\"The Oakland Enquirer of 23 September 1909 reported that he had flown on the Tuesday, which was 21 September. Chinese commemorations generally use 22 September, but 22 September 1909 was a Wednesday, so the 21st is the better-evidenced date. He flew for about twenty minutes in an elliptical circuit around a hilltop behind Piedmont, never more than ten to twelve feet up, ending when the bolt holding the propeller to the shaft sheared.\"}},{\"@type\":\"Question\",\"name\":\"Was Feng Ru really the first person to fly in California?\",\"acceptedAnswer\":{\"@type\":\"Answer\",\"text\":\"The defensible claim is the first recorded powered aeroplane flight in California and on the US West Coast \u2014 which is what the contemporary Oakland Enquirer asserted, and the first American air meet at Dominguez Field followed four months later in January 1910. It was not the first heavier-than-air flight in the state: John J. Montgomery flew gliders at Otay Mesa in 1883 and balloon-launched gliders at Santa Clara in 1905.\"}},{\"@type\":\"Question\",\"name\":\"Did Feng Ru build his own engine?\",\"acceptedAnswer\":{\"@type\":\"Answer\",\"text\":\"Yes. The Oakland Enquirer of 23 September 1909 records that the aircraft was driven by a six-horsepower engine of his own construction, under a subhead reading \\\"Motor and Aeroplane Are of His Own Build\\\". He had the castings made by different machine shops on the East Coast and assembled them himself, so that no single shop could work out the design.\"}},{\"@type\":\"Question\",\"name\":\"How did Feng Ru die?\",\"acceptedAnswer\":{\"@type\":\"Answer\",\"text\":\"He was killed flying an exhibition at the Yantang parade ground near Guangzhou in front of around a thousand spectators. He climbed to roughly thirty-six metres, flew some eight kilometres, pulled up too steeply, stalled and crashed, dying of his injuries in hospital aged 29. Chinese sources and the 1988 memorial stele date this to 25 August 1912; most Western accounts say 26 August.\"}},{\"@type\":\"Question\",\"name\":\"Where is Feng Ru buried?\",\"acceptedAnswer\":{\"@type\":\"Answer\",\"text\":\"At the Huanghuagang Mausoleum of the 72 Martyrs in Guangzhou, among the dead of the 1911 revolution, with an inscription naming him a pioneer of Chinese aviation. His tomb was listed as a Guangzhou municipal cultural relic in 1983. A monument also stands at the crash site, erected in 1988, and a bronze bust was unveiled at Laney College in Oakland on 21 September 2009, on ground where one of his workshops had stood.\"}}]}<\/script><p><em>Sources: Oakland Enquirer, 23 September 1909, Oakland History Room collection; The New York Times, 21 February 1911; Rebecca Maksel, &ldquo;The Father of Chinese Aviation&rdquo;, Smithsonian Air &amp; Space, 2008, quoting historian Patti Gully; Chinese and English Wikipedia; Oakland Public Library.<\/em><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n<div style=\"background:#f0f4ff;border-left:4px solid #5C91FF;padding:16px 20px;margin:32px 0 8px\"><p style=\"margin:0 0 8px;font-weight:600;color:#333\">Related Posts<\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><a href=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/afterburner\/douglas-world-cruisers-first-aerial-circumnavigation-1924\/\">Douglas World Cruisers: The First Flight Around the World, 1924<\/a><\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><a href=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/afterburner\/nanchang-j-12-lightest-supersonic-fighter-china\/\">Nanchang J-12: Mao&rsquo;s Pocket Fighter for Guerrilla Air War<\/a><\/p><p style=\"margin:4px 0\"><a href=\"https:\/\/migflug.com\/afterburner\/adrienne-bolland-andes-crossing-caudron-g3-1921\/\">Adrienne Bolland: She Flew the Andes With 40 Hours<\/a><\/p><\/div>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On a Tuesday evening in September 1909, in the hills behind Piedmont, California, a Chinese machinist took off in a biplane he had designed, built and powered with an engine he had also built, and flew an elliptical circuit around a hilltop for about twenty minutes into a strong wind. He came down when the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":20885600,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"editor_notices":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[665,666],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20886500","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-aviation-world","category-history-and-legends"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Feng Ru: The Man Who Built China\u2019s First Aeroplane in Oakland | MiGFlug<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Feng Ru built an aeroplane and its engine in an Oakland shack and flew it in 1909, the first powered flight in California. 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