A computer-generated video of a plane plunging into a residential area has been viewed millions of times in social media posts worldwide that misrepresented it as actual footage of a deadly air disaster in Brazil’s Sao Paulo state in August 2024. The aircraft model in the animated video did not correspond with the crashed plane operated by the Brazilian airline Voepass.
“Plane crash in Brazil,” read the Tagalog-language caption of a Facebook reel viewed more than 3.7 million times since it was shared on August 11, 2024.
It appeared to show an aircraft catching fire before crashing into a residential area.
At the video’s five-second mark, however, the name of German airline Lufthansa was shown on the aeroplane’s fuselage.
The video was also shared alongside a similar false claim in Tagalog, English, Spanish and Italian.
The posts circulated after a plane crashed in Brazil’s Sao Paulo state on August 9, 2024, killing all 62 people on board (archived link).
Videos showed the ATR 72-500 plane in a sickening downward spin before it crashed into a residential area in the town of Vinhedo, some 80 kilometres (50 miles) northwest of Brazil’s financial capital Sao Paulo.
The plane operated by airline Voepass fell almost vertically, landed on its belly and exploded in flames, striking with such force that it was nearly “flattened,” said Sao Paulo fire lieutenant Olivia Perroni Cazo.
Video game
Google reverse image searches found an earlier version of the video uploaded by TikTok user @fly_zone77 on August 10, 2024.
The video was captioned in part: “Moments Before Brazil plane crash”.
However, the TikTok user’s profile indicated the account posts clips from the action-adventure video game Grand Theft Auto V (GTA 5) (archived link).
Features of the video game include simulating plane crashes (archived link).
The TikTok account has regularly posted other animated videos of plane crashes.
AFP also found the aircraft featured in the circulating video did not correspond with the twin-propeller ATR 72-500 model operated by Voepass that crashed in Brazil (archived link).
Below is a screenshot comparison of the false video (left) and official photo of the ATR72-500 aircraft (right), with elements highlighted by AFP:
Witness videos of the incident — as reported by Spanish television network Noticias Telemundo and Argentinian newspaper Clarin — show the plane spinning downwards with no visible signs of catching fire before it crashed (archived links here and here).
AFP has published tips on how to spot computer-generated videos of plane crashes.
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