Old video falsely linked to Barauni Refinery blast in Bihar; no deaths - Alt News
Abhishek Kumar
20th September 2021 / 3:06 pm
On September 16, 19 people, including five refinery workers and 14 contract workers, were injured when a furnace in the AVU-1 unit exploded at the Barauni Refinery in Begusarai. Following the incident, a video of flames rising from an industrial area is being circulated on social media. It is being claimed that these visuals were taken during the blast at the refinery.
Sharing the clip on Facebook, Bihar State Secretary of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) Awadhesh Kumar demanded the best possible treatment for the injured and an inquiry into the incident. (Link to the post)
Awadhesh Kumar also amplified this video from his Twitter account. His post was retweeted by the official handle of the CPI (M) Bihar State Committee. (Archive link)
Den News Angpradesh posted this video on their Facebook page as breaking news of the Barauni Refinery accident. It racked up more than 35,000 views and more than 500 shares as of this writing.
Facebook user Deepak Kumar received over 12,000 views and 1,000 shares for the video.
Insider Live along with a Facebook page named Sheikhpura News carried the clip with the same message.
Similarly, this video was promoted by the Facebook pages of several local news outlets including Koshi Live 24, Madhubani Laukahi Live, The Vaishali Express, Rashtriya TV along with numerous users.
We performed a reverse image search of a frame from the viral video, which led us to the original video on LinkedIn. It was posted three years ago by a user named Mohammad Albuzaid. The original Arabic caption accompanying it reads, “Industrial accidents can cause a lot of damage. It is not wise to wait for a disaster to happen.” (Archive link)
We performed a reverse image search of a frame from this clip using Yandex. This led us to the original video that had been uploaded by a Facebook page on May 21, 2017.
Following a few more keyword searches, we also found the same video on YouTube uploaded on May 24, 2017.
These visuals have been on the internet since 2017 therefore, cannot represent the recent accident at the Barauni Refinery.
We examined the official IOCL website for more information and found a press release dated September 16, 2021 issued by the organisation. It stated that there had been no fire or death from the furnace blast.
Alt News can confirm that the video in question is at least four years old and has nothing to do with the Barauni Refinery explosion.
Abhishek is a senior fact-checking journalist and researcher at Alt News. He has a keen interest in information verification and technology. He is always eager to learn new skills, explore new OSINT tools and techniques. Prior to joining Alt News, he worked in the field of content development and analysis with a major focus on Search Engine Optimization (SEO).
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