Lighthouse Journalism found two spectacular videos of a bridge being widely shared on social media platforms. It was claimed along with these videos that they depict the National Highway in Jammu and Kashmir that is now open for business. During the investigation we found that the videos are from bridges in China and not India. Viral claims are misleading.
Claim:
Video 1:
Facebook user Yencee Mohan shared the video on his profile.
Check the archive version of the post here.
Other users too are sharing the same video.
Video 2:
X user @OPT_KHARIWALE shared another aerial video of a bridge claiming it to be from NH 44.
Check the archive version of the post.
Other users too are sharing the same video.
Investigation:
Video 1:
We started the investigation by running a reverse image search on the screenshots of the video.
We found similar visuals in a video uploaded on the YouTube channel of CGTN. The video was titled: “Beipanjiang Bridge in SW China officially world’s highest bridge”
Even the prompt after running the reverse image suggested that the video is of Beipanjiang Bridge.
We also found a similar video uploaded on the Facebook pages of China Daily and Shanghai Daily.
Both the reels suggested that the video features Beipanjiang Bridge, the world’s highest bridge. It is built 565 meters (1,850 feet) above the Beipan River Canyon between Guizhou Province and Yunnan Province.
Video 2:
We started the investigation of this video too by running a reverse image search on the screenshots obtained from the video.
The prompt received after running the reverse image suggested that the video featured Aizhai bridge.
We found the aerial visuals of the bridge uploaded on the Facebook page of People’s Daily, China.
Aizhai is one of the tallest suspension bridges in the world.
Several images of the bridge are available on stock images website.
Conclusion: Videos of Beipanjiang bridge and Aizhai bridge from China go viral in India claiming to be of national highway 44 in Jammu and Kashmir. Viral claims are misleading.
