This is the amusing moment two parents lower their three-year-old son into a cargo hold Mission Impossible style - to retrieve an important ship part.

The family took their son with them while they were working on the dry bulk carrier unloading gravel from the dock in the city of Bozhou in Anhui, eastern China.

Phone footage shows the dad lowering his brave son into the 13ft deep hold on March 17.

The parents pointed to the fallen piece of hardware as the toddler searched with his eyes before finally spotting it and picking it up with his hand.

Meanwhile, the boy's mum Ms Nian could be heard laughing as he was lowered in with a rubber strap into the pit like in the iconic vault scene of the 1996 action film Mission: Impossible where Tom Cruise's Ethan Hunt breaks into the CIA's most impenetrable vault.

Then, his dad pulled him back up and freed him from the strap, marking a successful end to the mission which thankfully went without incident.

Ms Nian later said: 'Kids are more useful than magnets.'

Dry bulk carriers like the ship in the video are shipping vessels with several holds that loose cargo is unloaded into before being transported and unloaded with a gantry crane.

Larger dry bulk carriers have their own cranes fitted onboard.