Old photos falsely shared as Iran president's deadly helicopter crash

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Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi was declared dead on May 20 after his helicopter crashed into a remote mountainside in heavy fog. However, photos circulated on social media worldwide purporting to show the wreckage of the stricken chopper in fact show a different crash. The images were published in Iranian news reports in 2020 about a police training plane that crashed in Mazandaran province. 

"Wreckage of the helicopter of the Iranian president and his delegation," read a Thai Facebook post that shared the photos.

The pictures show rescue workers in a forest next to aircraft debris with the number "1136" printed on the wing.

Screenshot of the false Facebook post, taken May 20, 2024

The photos surfaced in Facebook posts around the world, including in English, Bengali, Burmese, Greek, Hindi and Malay.

Iran-backed members of the so-called "Axis of Resistance" against Israel and its allies expressed their condolences on May 20 after Tehran confirmed president Ebrahim Raisi had died in a helicopter crash.

Among those killed when the helicopter crashed into a remote mountainside in heavy fog was Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, known for his fierce anti-Israel sentiment and scepticism of the West.

Old photos

A keyword search on Google found the photos in an Instagram post from April 23, 2020 by Iran's judiciary-linked Mizan news agency (archived link).

According to the post, the wreckage was found in northern Iran's Mazandaran province.

Below are screenshots of the photos shared in false Facebook posts (left) and Mizan's photos (right):

Screenshot comparison between one of the photos in the false post (left) and the Mizan's photo published in April 2020 (right). Taken May 20, 2024
Screenshot comparison between the the cropped photo in the false post (left) and the Mizan's photo published in April 2020 (right). Taken May 20, 2024

A similar photo featured in a report by Iran's official Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA) about a police training plane that crashed in Mazandaran due to poor weather conditions (archived link).

IRNA's report shows a photo of a plane wing with the number "1136" -- which matches the number seen on the aircraft in Mizan's photos.

Screenshot of the IRNA's news article, with the plane number highlighted by AFP

Another photo of plane wreckage that surfaced in some posts falsely linking it to Raisi's death also featured in Mizan's Instagram post.

Meanwhile, other posts showed a photo showing a blue and white helicopter on grassland.

That photo was published in news reports about the Raisi's crash, including Euro News and Iran's Mehr News Agency and Azad News Agency (ANA) (archived links here, here and here).

While it was not immediately possible to verify the authenticity of the image, AFP published a similar picture showing the location of helicopter wreckage.

A screen grab captured from a video shows the location of wreck of helicopter carrying Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and his delegation has been detected in Iran on May 20, 2024 (IRANIAN RED CRESCENT SOCIETY / ANADOLU / ANADOLU VIA AFP)
This article was amended to correct a typo in the seventh line. 
May 23, 2024 This article was amended to correct a typo in the seventh line.

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