By Daniel Adaji
A claim that 15 skyscrapers collapsed in China is trending online.
The claim was made by Ugwuja Salvation, with the username @GoldenS62371811 in a post on X app (formerly Twitter). He posted the video alongside a caption which read:
Oh My God! Is this #Rapture or What? Are People Not Inside This Building? How come 15 buildings have just collapsed in China or are they being demolished? Several lamentable voices were heard in the video.
The video was posted on Sunday, 23 September 2023 and has garnered over 37 thousand views, 40 reposts, 33 bookmarks, 40 comments, and 98 likes.
CLAIM
The video shows a building collapse in China with several voices of people lamenting.
THE FINDINGS
Findings by NatureFact show that the claim is MISLEADING. The video was posted out of context.
Contrary to the claim by the user, the video was tagged 15 buildings demolished in Kunming, China.
Further check shows that the video is not recent.
The InVID keyframe analysis tool was used to search the video for landmarks and, using Google Lens, to find sources, it was revealed that several publications have published some content regarding the demolition of the buildings.
Some X users raised concerns about whether the video was real as it seemed to differ from the context it was posted. However, NATUREFACT could not independently verify whether the scenario occurred, the location and what led to the demolition.
Results from a Google search revealed several credible media organisations globally have published similar reports and some have attempted to explain and debunk the claim.
News Track Live reported that “according to reports, these skyscrapers were demolished simultaneously. As per the information received, all the shops around these 15 buildings were also closed as security and people living nearby were sent to a safe place. They were reportedly demolished because they had been standing idle for a long time, whose basement was flooded.”
China Daily also reported that fifteen high-rise buildings were demolished by explosions at the same time in Kunming, Yunnan province, on 27 August 2021. Construction of the buildings had remained unfinished for seven years. It was the first time Yunnan had demolished so many high-rises at once.
AFP had earlier investigated the footage in February 2023 when it was falsely linked to the 7.8-magnitude earthquake between Turkey and Syria. As stated by AFP, a video of both buildings’ demolition was reported on by a Russian news service in August 2022, alongside multiple other Chinese media outlets.
VERDICT
The claim that the video shows a building collapsing in China is MISLEADING; the footage is an old video being circulated as that of a recent building collapse in China.