Full Text
The world was shaken by the unexpected news of the death of Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi, The news sent ripples through the political and social landscape both within Iran and globally. Ebrahim Raisi was confirmed dead after search and rescue teams found the crashed chopper in a fog-shrouded area in the western mountain region.
However, videos and pictures of the incident have lit social media ablaze. Consequently, DUBAWA investigated some of these posts to verify their authenticity.
Claim 1: An X user @DianaWallace888 also shared a crashing image with a description that says, “If nobody else is going to say it, then I will. The president of Iran obviously had his helicopter shot out of the sky by a space laser!”
Verdict: The picture backdates to 2019. It was an incident that happened in the US State of Hawaii on the island of Oahu, where a tourist helicopter crashed.
Verification
A Google Reverse Image search revealed that the image shared by the user has been circulating since January 5, 2019. According to a news report by Forum Daily, the image depicts an accident in Hawaii, on the island of Oahu, where a tourist helicopter crashed. The crash resulted in the deaths of three people who were on board.
Conclusion
The picture of the crashed helicopter is not related to the plane crash involving the late Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi.
Claim 2: Accompanied by an image of a crashed airplane, An X user @VacancyKart claimed that “Many Bodies of those who died in the Iran President Raisi helicopter crash have been burnt and cannot be identified”.
Verdict: False. According to news reports, the video showed a training plane flying from Bisheh Kolah to Tehran. It crashed near Mutalaq, and the wreckage was found in Iran’s Kila Kala Abbas Abad area. This happened long ago before the crash of the late President of Iran Ebrahim Raisi.
Verification
A Google reverse image search led to Iranian media reports featuring the viral picture. According to a Jahan News report, originally in Persian but translated into English using Google Translate, the image depicts a training plane flying from Bisheh Kolah to Tehran that crashed near Mutalaq (Salman Shahr).
The wreckage was discovered in Iran’s Kila Kala Abbas Abad area. Reports indicate that the plane crashed during a police operation due to adverse weather conditions. Several other local media reports from the same period also confirmed that the viral photo showed the crash site as Kila Kala Abbas Abad, featuring various images of the incident.
Conclusion
The viral image depicting a crashed aeroplane happened in 2020.
