An attempted robbery on a passenger bus traveling from Pu'er to Kunming was repelled by bus passengers resulting in the death of one of the two thieves while the other clings to life in a hospital, according to local media reports.

At 5:53 am on Sunday, the bus was on the Anchu expressway near Lufeng when two men on board the bus suddenly produced knives and attempted to rob the vehicle's passengers.

According to Kunming police, two bus drivers and the passengers engaged in a life-or-death struggle with the men in which the two drivers and two passengers were injured. The injured drivers and passengers have been released from hospitalization.

The two would-be robbers, both men from Guangxi Autonomous Region, were armed with a 20 centimeter knife and a large pair of scissors. Initially one of the men threatened a female passenger with the knife while the other man used the scissors to force the driver to stop the bus.

Two male passengers engaged the man with the knife while the driver and another driver on the bus fought the man with the scissors. After both men had been subdued – during which both of them were seriously injured – the bus drove to Kunming's Nanyao Bus Station, where one of the men was pronounced dead.

The other man is currently in the intensive care unit of a Kunming hospital in critical condition.

The foiled robbery was the second deadly bus incident in southwestern China in a two-day span. On Friday, a bus heading into Chengdu burst into flames, killing 27 passengers and hospitalizing 72. It has not been determined if the fire was accidental or intentional.