On May 20, Singapore Airlines flight SQ321 hit severe turbulence over the Indian Ocean, leaving a British man dead and more than two dozen other passengers injured.
A dramatic video being shared online purports to show the turbulent scene from inside the plane. In the video, a flight attendant can be seen being thrown onto the ceiling as the camera shakes and airline safety materials drop from various compartments.
“#ShockingVideo of the moment of turbulence on the Singapore Airlines Boeing 777-30Vidothers,” one post claims.
THE QUESTION
Does this video show the turbulence on Singapore Airlines flight 321?
THE SOURCES
- Original video posted by Sky News on June 17, 2019
- InVid and RevEye, video and photo forensics tools
THE ANSWER
No, this video doesn’t show the turbulence on Singapore Airlines flight 321. It shows turbulence on a different flight in 2019.
WHAT WE FOUND
The video that appears in the viral posts is real and does show turbulence on a plane, but it’s several years old. The video actually shows the scene from an ALK Airlines Boeing 737 flight in June 2019.
Using RevEye, a reverse image search tool, VERIFY traced the video seen in the viral X posts to this video from British television channel Sky News on June 17, 2019. The Bulgarian airline flight took off from Pristina, the capital city of Kosovo, and was traveling to EuroAirport Basel, an airport operated jointly by France and Switzerland. According to ABC News reports from 2019, the flight seen in this viral video experienced turbulence 20 minutes before landing in Basel, Switzerland.
“This is the moment a flight attendant was thrown to the ceiling of the plane after violent turbulence. Ten people had minor injuries on the flight from Pristina to EuroAirport Basel,” the post said.
VERIFY could confirm the videos are the same by comparing the scene in both the 2019 video and the video being shared with claims it shows the interior of Singapore Airlines flight SQ321. At the six-second mark in both videos, the flight attendant can be seen being flung onto the plane’s ceiling. The same woman can be seen on the plane at the 17-second mark of both videos.
The flight attendant was trying to "collect all drinks and full glasses from passengers" before the turbulence occurred. That is what can be seen happening in the video. The flight attendant was in “perfectly good health” following the flight, the ABC News report from the 2019 incident said.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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