Old video from South Africa falsely shared as Turkey-Syria quake 'tsunami'

This article is more than one year old.
Published on February 10, 2023 at 09:49
2 min read
By Adrià LABORDA, AFP Spain, AFP Hong Kong
Translation and adaptation Clara IP

Footage of massive waves crashing onto a beach is circulating in social media posts that falsely claim it shows a "tsunami" triggered by a devastating earthquake that struck near the Turkish-Syrian border on February 6. The clip has been viewed hundreds of thousands of times in the posts, but it actually shows waves that lashed a beach in South Africa in March 2017.

The video was posted on Chinese social media site Sina Weibo on February 8, where it has more than 105,000 views.

"An earthquake of around 8.0 magnitude occurred near Turkey and triggered a tsunami," the simplified Chinese post reads.

"Turkey had two strong earthquakes of magnitude 7.8 in one day."

Screenshot of a post sharing the false claim, taken on February 8, 2023

The video was shared in similar posts in various languages, including Arabic, Portuguese and Ukrainian, which linked it to the 7.8 magnitude earthquake that struck near Gaziantep in southeastern Turkey and northern Syria on February 6.

Malaysian news organisation Nanyang Siang Pau also featured the video in a report about the disaster.

The earthquake had killed at least 21,000 people, as of February 10, in one of the region's worst disasters for a century.

AFP found no credible news reports that the earthquake triggered a tsunami.

Waves in South Africa

A reverse image search on Google found the video in a report from March 14, 2017 by South Africa's Expresso Show.

"On Sunday 12 March 2017, Durban North Beach was shut down due to massive waves that hit the beach," the video description says.

Below is a screenshot comparison of the video in the false post (left) and the video in Expresso Show's report (right):

Screenshot comparison of the video in the false post (left) and the video in Expresso Show's report

Durban's North Beach was closed to swimmers due to the heavy winds and waves, South African news organisation eNCA reported.

Furthermore, the location in the video corresponds with Google Street View imagery of Durban North Beach.

Below is a screenshot comparison of the video in false posts (left) and Google Maps imagery (right), with similarities highlighted.

A screenshot comparison of the video in the false post (left) and the Google Map imagery (right) with simialrities circled by AFP.

AFP has debunked a string of false claims about the Turkey-Syria earthquake, including footage of an apartment block collapsing in Florida falsely linked to the quake and various photos shared as the aftermath of the disaster.

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Old video from South Africa falsely shared as Turkey-Syria quake 'tsunami'

Waves in South Africa

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