One of the intended high­lights of my 2007 trip to Bei­jing was a foray into the city’s grim “Cen­tral Busi­ness Dis­trict.” I had been fol­low­ing with great enthu­si­asm the con­struc­tion of Rem Koolhaas’s breath­tak­ing CCTV Head­quar­ters, a unique sky­scraper with a seem­ingly impos­si­ble can­tilevered loop at the top. I had hoped to get a fan­tas­tic sun­set photo of the tow­ers, which had not yet been con­nected, and their sis­ter struc­ture, the Orwellian-sounding Tele­vi­sion Cul­tural Cen­ter. Unfor­tu­nately, I was con­fronted with air pol­lu­tion so thick that from one block away, I could barely dis­cern the upper sto­ries of both struc­tures. I left dis­ap­pointed, bring­ing home only a cough that would last for weeks.

Yes­ter­day the smaller TVCC tower was con­sumed by fire, appar­ently ignited by an ille­gal fire­works dis­play com­mis­sioned by CCTV (the tele­vi­sion arm of the state-run media). And although the orga­ni­za­tion appears to be accept­ing respon­si­bil­ity, you’d prob­a­bly never hear about it in China: offi­cials directed the press to pub­lish “no pho­tos, no video clips, no in-depth reports” of the inci­dent and that “com­ments post­ing areas should be closed.” Amus­ing, isn’t it, that the Chi­nese media could burn a promi­nent, world-class sky­scraper to the ground and decide that it’s not newsworthy?