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| - Fact Check: Video of 2022 Puerto Rico hurricane FALSELY shared as recent Cyclone Gabrielle in New Zealand
The video shows Hurricane Fiona which struck Puerto Rico in September 2022.
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India Today Fact Check
This video shows Hurricane Fiona which struck Puerto Rico in September 2022.
At least four people have reportedly died during the recent Cyclone Gabrielle in New Zealand. Though the cyclone has subsided now, it has left thousands of people displaced.
According to a February 15 report by Deutsche Welle, the New Zealand police have been unable to contact over 1,400 people. The island country had to declare a state of emergency after the cyclone caused widespread flooding and landslides.
Amid this, a video of a storm allegedly from a recent cyclone has been shared widely on social media. It shows strong winds almost uprooting a tree as debris flies around.
The archived version of this post can be seen here.
Malayalam news websites like Manorama Online and “TheFourthNews.in” used this video in their recent reports on Cyclone Gabrielle.
AFWA found that the viral video is an old video and from Puerto Rico, not New Zealand.
AFWA Probe
We noticed that many people responded to the viral Twitter post saying that the video was not from New Zealand.
A quick reverse search of the viral video’s keyframes led us to a tweet by Brett Adair, a meteorologist from Alabama, US, from September 19, 2022. He had shared several videos supposedly showing Hurricane Fiona in action. He stated that these videos were filmed west of Ponce in Puerto Rico. The viral video was part of this.
Using this clue, we ran a keyword search and found a screenshot of this video in a Yahoo report from September 19, 2022.
As per this report, it showed Hurricane Fiona wreaked havoc in Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic in September 2022. At least 25 people were killed in Puerto Rico because of the hurricane. It caused heavy rainfall, mudslides, floods, and large-scale power disruption.
The Weather Channel and AccuWeather also used the viral video in their reports related to hurricane Fiona at the time.
Thus, it’s clear that this video has nothing to do with the recent cyclone in New Zealand.
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