A clip of a waterspout at a Florida beach is being misrepresented as Hurricane Idalia
CLAIM: A video of a whirling mist creating havoc on a beach in Florida was filmed during Hurricane Idalia.
AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. The video shows a “waterspout” on June 16 at Clearwater Beach on Florida’s west coast, according to a description of the clip on Storyful, a social video licensing agency, and news reports at the time.
THE FACTS: As Hurricane Idalia made landfall early Wednesday morning in Florida’s Big Bend region, some on social media falsely claimed that a months-old video showed the Category 3 storm.
The clip shows a waterspout — a “whirling column of air and water mist,” per the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration — as it moves across the ocean and onto a beach, while people run for cover and items such as chairs and towels are swept away.
One Facebook post shared the footage along with the caption: “Hurricane Idalia has started. #Hurricane #Idalia #HurricaneIdalia #Florida #Weather.”
But the video is more than two months old and did not capture Idalia, or any hurricane.
Its description on Storyful states that it was filmed on June 16 at Clearwater Beach and shows “a waterspout that spun ashore.” The footage was featured by many majornewsoutlets that covered the incident.
Similar video of the waterspout, filmed from a different angle, was posted on Facebook June 16 by the Clearwater Police Department.
“A small #waterspout moved ashore quickly this afternoon on #ClearwaterBeach near lifeguard Tower 2,” a caption on the post reads. “Two people went to the hospital with minor injuries after being struck by flying debris.”
Although this video does not show Hurricane Idalia, Clearwater Beach was hit by the storm. Facebook posts from the Clearwater Police Department show effects such as major flooding on nearby roads.
Idalia made landfall Wednesday morning near Keaton Beach — approximately 200 miles (1.6 kilometers) from Clearwater in a lightly-populated region where the Florida Panhandle curves into the peninsula — with maximum sustained winds near 125 mph (205 kph). It caused significant damage in Florida and Georgia, but had weakened to a tropical storm with winds of 70 mph (113 kph) by Wednesday afternoon.
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This is part of AP’s effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. Learn more about fact-checking at AP.
