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| - Fact Check: 10-year-old video from Canada shared as Russian troops' movement in Ukraine
A video of a goods train carrying armoured tanks and military equipment went viral, with the claim that it was Russian weaponry en route to Ukraine. India Today Anti-Fake News War room ( AFWA) has found the video to be from Canada.
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India Today Fact Check
This viral video was first uploaded to YouTube in 2012 and it has nothing to do with Russia. It shows a Canadian National Railways train carrying ground force equipment for the Canadian armed forces.
A video of a goods train carrying armoured tanks and military equipment has gone viral with the claim that this was Russian weaponry on its way to Ukraine.
This video along with the claim went viral on Facebook at the time when, as per the news reports, Russia sent a 40-mile-long convoy to the northern side of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv.
One of the Facebook posts sharing the viral video claimed, “Russia has sent lots of Arms, Tanks, Weapons to the capital city of Ukraine on a Goods Train which is VIRTUALLY ENDLESS!”
The India Today Anti-Fake News War room (AFWA) found this video was not from Russia or Ukraine at all. It was first uploaded to YouTube in 2012 and shows a Canadian National Railways train carrying ground force equipment for the Canadian armed forces.
AFWA probe
Looking carefully at the viral video, we saw “CN” written on the locomotive engine. The engine number mentioned at the top was “2235”. The logo for the Canadian National Railway, the Canadian freight railway company, is similar to the “CN” seen on the engine.
We tried to find the original video with the help of the InVID tool and reverse image search. We found that the viral video has been on the internet for several years now.
Initial searches on Yandex or on Google, however, led us to YouTube videos that claimed it showed Russian forces.
But since we suspected the locomotive to belong to the Canadian National Railway, we kept searching for the original video. On Bing, the reverse image search results yielded the same viral video on YouTube with the title, “CN 2235, CN 8803 - Ultra Rare Canadian Military Train - Westbound - Lovekin, ON.”
The Amnesty YouTube DataViewer showed the video was uploaded on YouTube on August 30, 2012.
The details on YouTube about the video read, “Rare sighting of CN 2235 & 8803 moving a large division of the Canadian Armed Forces ground force equipment and some empty autocars westbound.” It is the same engine number that is visible in the viral video.
Geolocating the viral video
Since we could not find any credible news report regarding the video, we tried to geolocate the spot on the viral video.
As written in the title of the YouTube video, the train was Westbound and the place mentioned was “Lovekin, ON”. Lovekin is located in Ontario, Canada.
The website of the Toronto Railway Historical Association noted that Lovekin was “One of the best locations to view railroads in Ontario!” The website added, “The spot is located at the eastern edge of the Greater Toronto Area, south of the town of Newcastle on Lakeshore Road just a short distance from Lake Ontario.”
This website also published winter photos of Lovekin and the spot from where the railway lines are visible. Even though these photos were taken in the winter when the terrain was mostly covered by snow, the spot looked similar to the viral and the YouTube video.
With the help of Google Maps, we found the exact location where the viral video was shot. We cross-checked it with Google Street View.
The viral video was likely shot from an elevated location or from a bridge. We found on Google Street View a wooden bridge on Lakeshore Road overlooking the railway tracks.
Comparing the screengrab of the viral video, the YouTube video, and the Google Street View image, we found similar elements, like the electrical posts, another railway track beside the one on which the locomotive was running, and the same cluster of trees on the horizon.
From this evidence, we can conclude that a 2012 video of the Canadian National Railway in Lovekin, Ontario was falsely shared as the recent military movement of Russian forces in Ukraine.
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