It may have seemed like a good idea at the time.

In an apparent attempt to create a shortcut, two people allegedly used heavy machinery to remove a sizeable section of the Great Wall of China in Shanxi province, according to an online notice by local authorities.

The duo used an excavator to widen a pre-existing gap so that their heavy machinery could pass through it, according to the notice issued by Youyu County security officials.

The pair — a 38-year-old man named Zheng and a 55-year-old woman named Wang — removed the wall “to shorten a journey,” according to a CNBC translation of the notice published on Aug. 31. The suspects are both from Inner Mongolia.

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