Video shows Philadelphia plane crash, not Indian airstrike on Pakistan

Published on May 28, 2025 at 10:42
Updated on June 4, 2025 at 03:18
3 min read
By Devesh MISHRA, AFP India

New Delhi and Islamabad engaged in four days of intense fighting during their most serious conflict in decades in early May, but social media posts about the violence have falsely shared a video of an air crash in the United States as the aftermath of an Indian attack on a Pakistani market. The clip corresponds to footage showing the impact of a transport jet crash in Philadelphia on January 31.

"Breaking News: Lahore's Jinnah Market is completely destroyed. Pakistan will take years to recover from this," reads a Hindi-language caption to a video shared on Facebook on May 9, 2025.

The 33-second clip, which has been viewed 17,000 times, shows a parking lot littered with debris, some of which is still on fire. An Urdu-language announcement appears to be asking residents to leave the area.

The post included the hashtag for "Operation Sindoor", New Delhi's name for its retaliatory action against Pakistan, which it says backed militants who carried out a deadly April 22 attack on tourists in the Indian-administered side of disputed Kashmir (archived link). Islamabad denies any role and has called for an independent probe.

A ceasefire was reached on May 10 after four days of intense fighting involving drones, fighter jet, missile and artillery attacks that left more than 70 people dead on both sides (archived link).

Screenshot of the false post, taken on May 14, 2025

The video circulated elsewhere on Facebook and YouTube with a similar claim it shows the aftermath of an attack on Pakistan.

However, the clip matches with other footage following an air crash in Philadelphia in January.

A reverse image search using the keyframes of the clip found a longer version uploaded by a US-based vlogger on YouTube on February 1, 2025 (archived link).

Text overlaid on the video reads "Plane crash in Philadelphia".

Screenshot comparison of the clip shared in false posts (L) and the video uploaded on YouTube

AFP reported a medical jet crashed in Northeast Philadelphia on January 31, 2025, shortly after takeoff, killing all six people on board and at least one person on the ground (archived link).

The crash, in a busy Philadelphia neighbourhood, also injured at least 19 others and damaged multiple homes and vehicles due to resulting fires and explosions.

Subsequent keyword searches led to footage taken by the United States' National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) published by local broadcaster 6abc Action News in its March 7 report about new findings on the crash (archived link).

The NTSB aerial footage shows the same signboard for the Dunkin' doughnut chain store seen in the circulating video. Later on in the video, a reporter is seen standing at the scene of the crash with the same red buildings in the background.

The red building is located at Cottman Ave, Philadelphia, opposite a Dunkin' store, as seen on Google Maps Street View imagery of the area (archived link).