Video shows Spanish navy vessel, not Philippines' 'first nuclear submarine'

Published on July 28, 2023 at 10:10
3 min read
By Ara Eugenio, AFP Philippines

A video has been viewed thousands of times alongside a false claim it shows the Philippines' first nuclear submarine on a test dive in disputed waters in the South China Sea near the western island of Palawan. The footage is in fact of an underwater vessel owned by the Spanish navy in waters near Cartagena in Spain. A Philippine Navy representative told AFP the country has yet to acquire a submarine of its own.

"PHILIPPINES NUCLEAR SUBMARINE TESTED IN PALAWAN ! WEST PHILIPPINE SEA 1BREAKING NEWS (sic)," reads the Tagalog-language title of a video shared on YouTube on July 9, 2023.

Manila refers to waters immediately to its west as the West Philippine Sea, parts of which are also claimed by China -- which lays claim to most of the resource-rich and strategically important South China Sea (archived link).

The clip, which has been viewed more than 5,000 times, appears to show a half-submerged submarine moving through the sea.

Tagalog-language text overlaid on the clip repeats the claim about a newly-acquired vessel on a test dive off the coast of Palawan island.

"NEW NUCLEAR SUBMARINE OF THE PHILIPPINES KEPT AS A SECRET FROM THE PUBLIC TO AVOID SPECULATION," the superimposed text goes on to claim.

Screenshot of the false YouTube video, captured on July 27, 2023

The YouTube video was uploaded days after the Philippine Coast Guard on July 5 accused Chinese patrol vessels of blocking two of its boats in the disputed South China Sea in late June, describing their actions as "very dangerous".

Although the description of the false YouTube video claims it is a "video reaction parody", user comments indicated some believed it showed a Philippine-owned nuclear submarine.

"I wonder how many of these we have," one user said.

"If this is being hidden from the public why did you expose it? Don't be a traitor to the Philippines, you're subjecting it to danger," another commented.

A similar false video was uploaded to a video sharing site here, while a link to that post was shared on Facebook here.

But a Philippine Navy representative told AFP the video is "fake news".

"As of the moment, the Philippines has no submarine and has no scheduled delivery of any submarine. The submarine acquisition is still on the planning table," the representative said on July 27.

Spanish navy submarine

The video has also been debunked by Filipino media organisation Vera Files here (archived link).

Separate Google reverse image searches by AFP found the clip shared in the false post corresponds to a video uploaded on July 7, 2023 on a YouTube channel belonging to Navantia, a shipbuilding company owned by the Spanish government.

Its Spanish-language title says it shows an S-81 submarine called "Isaac Peral" in waters near Cartagena, in southeastern Spain.

The version of the video in the false posts has been cropped and mirrored. A darker filter was also applied to the false video.

Below are screenshot comparisons of the video used in the false post (left) and the mirrored version of the video uploaded by Navantia:

Screenshot comparisons of the video used in the false post (left) and the mirrored version of the video uploaded by Navantia

According to an English-language blog post on Navantia's website, the Isaac Peral submarine was launched in Cartagena in May 2021 (archived link).

Spanish news outlet Atalayar reported at the time that the vessel was the Spanish navy's "first new generation non-nuclear propulsion submarine" (archived link).

Its first dive tests were conducted on March 30, 2023 in the waters off the Spanish naval station of La Algameca in Cartagena, reported by Naval News here and European Defence Review Magazine here (archived links here and here).

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