Liu Xinting

A brave Alibaba employee who saved four people from drowning in a Hangzhou lake has been rewarded with a lifetime supply of fish heads.

Liu Xinting, 42, leapt into action after he saw a car carrying two men and two women plunge into Thousand Island Lake at around noon on Sunday.

He was traveling back to Hangzhou with colleagues and their family members in a convoy of cars after a lunch of fish heads－a local delicacy－in neighboring Quzhou, he said on Tuesday.

To reward his bravery, Hangzhou Qiandao Lake Development Group, which operates several fish restaurants, announced on its WeChat account on Monday that it would provide Liu free fish heads for life.

Liu said he was traveling in the opposite lane when he saw a blue pickup truck rear-end a red car while attempting to change lanes, causing the car to lose control and plunge downhill about 10 meters into the lake.

Liu ran down the hill with the driver of the pickup truck and shouted to his colleagues to call the police.

The red car was floating about 20 meters offshore with its windows open when Liu reached it, and it sank soon after Liu tugged the four people out.

"It was actually really dangerous because I jumped into the lake with my clothes and shoes on," Liu said. "But it was an emergency, it was too dangerous to leave them in the water."

The four were tourists from Shanghai who had come to visit Thousand Island Lake. Local traffic police told Hangzhou Daily that the tourists had all returned home in good condition.

"I never thought my colleagues and I would experience something like that," Liu wrote on WeChat Moments. "It was a relief to save the four visitors. I heard that the driver of the red car felt guilty, but it was not her fault. I hope they can get over the trauma."

Liu, a product manager for Alibaba Cloud, received a thumbs-up from Jack Ma, chairman of Alibaba Group, through the company's internal network after learning of his bravery.

He Wei in Shanghai contributed to this story.