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| - Fact Check: Horrific video of millions of tyres burning is from Kuwait, but it's TWO YEARS old
It was reportedly a case of arson and firefighters took more than seven hours to douse the flames.
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India Today Fact Check
This video shows a 2021 arson incident at a ‘tyre graveyard’ in Kuwait.
As New York City became the most polluted city in the world on June 6, with massive clouds of haze seething from wildfires in Canada engulfing the city, a video of a sea of discarded tyres burning made the rounds on the internet.
“Look at this apocalyptic burn of 42 million tires in Kuwait, spewing toxic carcinogenic chemicals of benzene, xylene, ethylene, and acetone into the atmosphere. It could be seen on satellite from space,” declared a tweet containing the video of uncountable tyres burning, with plumes of thick black smoke billowing from them. Its archived version can be seen here.
OUR PROBE
Upon reverse-searching keyframes from the viral video, we found it in several media reports from August 2021. An India Today report from August 2021 that contained a viral video reported that fire engulfed the world’s largest “tyre graveyard” in Sulaibiya, Kuwait. The sheer scale of the fire, the report said, could be assessed from the fact that it was visible from space. We also came across several YouTube channels featuring the viral video from August 2021, which can be seen here and here.
According to a France 24 report, satellite images captured a huge cloud of black smoke coming from a massive fire in the Salmi landfill in Kuwait’s Jahra district. The report said that while the video went viral on July 29, 2021, the video was from an incident earlier that year.
Citing Kuwaiti news stories, France 24 reported that a fire broke out on April 29, 2021, in the “tyre graveyard” and firefighters managed to put out the flames after seven hours. The report further said that there were no victims and that the fire was a case of arson. It also added that such tyre graveyards in Kuwait frequently witnessed fires, with one in 2012 lasting three days.
Kuwait had made a business of importing used and worn-out tyres from other countries. However, the trade was banned in 2001. The Kuwaiti government has in recent years taken various measures to curb the hazardous impacts of these dumped tires.
According to a 2021 report, the government initiated the establishment of five factories to cut, recycle, and export these tires. A Reuters report from September 2021 mentioned a plant run by the EPSCO Global General Trading recycling company at al-Salmi in Kuwait that sorted and shredded scrap tyres, before pressing the particles into rubbery coloured flooring tiles. The report added that the government hoped to turn al-Salmi into a recycling hub.
Thus, it’s clear that an old video of a fire in Kuwait’s largest tyre dumping ground is being shared as a recent event.
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