Old clip of Mississippi tornado survivor falsely linked to Hurricane Milton

Hurricane Milton whipped up a spate of deadly tornadoes as it tore a coast-to-coast path of destruction across the US state of Florida, but a video of a panicked driver caught in a whirlwind is unrelated to the October 2024 storm. It was filmed as a twister struck Moss Point, Mississippi more than a year earlier.

"Dude gets caught inside hurricane Milton in his car SCARY #Milton #HurricanMilton #Florida #HurricaneMilton," says an October 10, 2024 post sharing the clip on X.

The video shows a man trapped in his vehicle as the wind tilts trees and sends debris flying across his windshield, shattering his window.

"The roof is tearing off of my customer's house," he says in between expletives and cries for help. "I was just about to go home."

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Screenshot from X taken October 10, 2024

Similar posts spread across other platforms, including TikTok, Threads and YouTube, after Milton made landfall October 9 on the Florida Gulf Coast as a major Category 3 storm.

The ferocious winds smashed inland and blasted communities still reeling from Hurricane Helene two weeks earlier, leaving at least four people dead and millions without power. Officials issued dozens of tornado warnings as the storm blew through, with several touching down.

But the video of the driver is unrelated.

Keyword searches on TikTok surfaced the same video posted by the Weather Channel on June 20, 2023 (archived here).

"Antonio Ramos had just finished installing cable in a Moss Point, Mississippi, home when a tornado tore through town," the caption says.

@weatherchannel Antonio Ramos had just finished installing cable in a Moss Point, Mississippi, home when a tornado tore through town. #TheWeatherChannel#fyp#weathertok#weatherchannel#tornado#pov#weatherchannel#storm♬ original sound - The Weather Channel

Local news station WLOX and Live Storms Media, a company that licenses storm footage, also shared Ramos's recording (archived here and here).

"I see something zoom past me and I see leaves, and then I see insulation, then I see shingles and the wind just gets harder and harder, and the sky gets dark," Ramos told WLOX. "I'm like 'Oh my goodness, it's right on top of me.'"

AFP has debunked other misinformation about hurricanes here.

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