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PeakMetrics / Fact Checks

Disasters & emergencies fact checks

Explore claims publishers have checked about disasters & emergencies. Read their original ratings and follow the evidence.

3,262 published reviews in this topic

FACTLYDisasters & emergencies

Visuals of Cyclone Tauktae from Somnath, Gujarat

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerns a video of large waves crashing onto shore, said to show Cyclone Tauktae at Somnath, Gujarat. FACTLY reports that its investigation found the footage was already online before the cyclone reached Gujarat and identified matching visuals associated with San Sebastián, Spain. The review says its search found iStock images resembling the post’s footage, titled as images from San Sebastian Donostia. To investigate the location, FACTLY searched for similar videos using “San Sebastian Waves.” It found a video uploaded on 14 November 2019 titled “Giant waves in San Sebastian as Storm Bernardo hits Spain’s Basque Country,” as well as a YouTube video uploaded on 24 January 2018 titled “Giant Waves Festival In San Sebastian- Big Waves in San Sebastian.” FACTLY describes the latter as similar to the shared video and says it showed the same background; its description identified Paseo Nuevo in San Sebastian. FACTLY then compared the footage’s surroundings with Google Street View of Paseo Nuevo. The review says a hill and rocks beside the footpath matched, and that railings and a streetlight also appeared similar, although the Street View was taken from a different direction. The review separately places Tauktae’s landfall between Diu and Una at around 9 pm on 17 May 2021. On the evidence it describes, the shared footage appears to be from Spain, not Somnath.

El Detector / Univision NoticiasDisasters & emergencies

el video que circuló por Facebook es del rescate de un auto atrapado en el desplome del Metro de Ciudad de México

Publisher’s rating: Falso

El Detector examined a real video of people being rescued from a car that circulated on Facebook as footage of the May 3, 2021, Mexico City Metro collapse. Its review says the images did show a rescue, but not one connected to the Metro disaster: the video came from an earlier traffic accident in Xochimilco, Mexico City. The distinction is that the footage itself was genuine, while its attribution to the Metro collapse was false. To trace the footage, the review reports that Mexican newspaper Excélsior identified the original video as a post by Grupo Voluntario Raíz Rescate, published on Twitter at 12:30 a.m. on April 28, 2021. The post described a truck carrying alfalfa that apparently lost its brakes near carretera nueva a Santa Cecilia and camino a la Joya, in the pueblo of San Lorenzo Atemoaya. El Detector says its own Google searches using details from that post found reports of a truck crash in Xochimilco, including accounts that three people died. The review also describes how the misattribution spread: Facebook posts presented the clip as a rescue following the Metro collapse, and one version carried wording claiming it showed motorists trapped by the Line 12 Metro collapse. The review reports that those posts were later deleted, but that archived pages were used by Excélsior to establish that they had made the claim. El Detector’s conclusion is that the clip was real but showed the April 28 Xochimilco traffic accident, not the May 3 Metro disaster.

FACTLYDisasters & emergencies

Image of collapsed buildings due to a major Earthquake in Assam

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerned a social-media image presented as showing a building partly collapsed in a major earthquake in Assam. FACTLY’s investigation says the image was instead taken in Kathmandu, Nepal, on 25 April 2015, during a severe earthquake there. It concludes that the image was more than six years old and unrelated to Assam’s 2021 earthquake. FACTLY describes its image check: a reverse image search led to an older news article. According to the review, that article dated the image to 25 April 2015 and located it in Kathmandu. This provenance is the key evidence against the image caption: the picture predated the Assam event and depicted damage in a different country. The review distinguishes the false attribution from the real earthquake in Assam. It reports that a magnitude 6.4 earthquake struck the state around 8 a.m. on 28 April 2021, damaging houses and buildings. It also notes a separate building in Nagaon that tilted against an adjacent building during the Assam tremors. Those events do not make the older Kathmandu photograph evidence of Assam damage.

Vishvas NewsDisasters & emergencies

Assam may witness a 7-8 magnitude earthquake

Publisher’s rating: Misleading

The claim arose in Assam in 2021, when a screenshot of a Hindustan Times story warning that the state might witness a magnitude 7–8 earthquake “on Friday” circulated on social media. The timing caused concern because the review says Assam had experienced 19 tremors in two days, including a magnitude 6.4 quake, and the following day was Friday. The question the review examined was whether the screenshot described a current forecast, not whether earthquakes had occurred in Assam. Vishvas News searched for the screenshot using keywords and says it found the exact story on the Hindustan Times website. The decisive detail was the story’s date: it had been filed on September 7, 2006, making it about 15 years old at the time of circulation. The review identifies the story as written by Syed Zarir Hussain for IANS and reports that Hussain confirmed it was old and irrelevant to Assam’s then-current situation. Thus, the circulated screenshot did not establish a fresh prediction for the Friday in 2021. Its age and the original reporter’s confirmation show that an old report was being presented in a way that made it seem current. The review describes the claim as misleading on that basis.

FACTLYDisasters & emergencies

Video of an emergency landing of a plane with its front wheel resting on a pickup truck plying on a road

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The post presented footage of a plane landing with its front wheel on a pickup truck as a real emergency that saved 300 passengers. FACTLY examined that specific video and reported that the visuals were instead from the video game GTA5. The review describes how its investigators followed a lead from comments on the viral video: they searched YouTube using relevant terms and found gaming-enthusiast uploads of the same footage. In one upload, they matched the scene—including the plane’s front wheel on a pickup truck on a highway after an engine fire—and noted that the title identified it as GTA5 gameplay. The review also says the upload dated February 9, 2019, had more than 90 million views. FACTLY says it found the exact clip in another YouTube upload as well. It reports finding no media coverage with the same visuals, but its decisive evidence is the matching footage published and identified as gameplay—not the absence of news reports alone. The review concludes that the video was passed off as a real incident.

FACTLYDisasters & emergencies

Video of a car bouncing off the top of a truck and a bus plying on a subway

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerns a video presented as real footage from the UK, showing a car flying over two roads on top of buses to evade police. FACTLY’s review identifies the video as a car bouncing off a truck while a bus travels on a subway and concludes that it was computer-generated rather than a real incident. The review says its investigation traced the video to a graphic designer’s accounts, where it was shared as animation.