2022 video from Mumbai shared as motorbike catching fire amid recent heatwave in Bihar

(Trigger Warning: The video in question contains visuals of a distressing nature. We have refrained from adding active links to the video.)

What is the claim?

Several Indian states, including Delhi, Punjab, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, and Bihar, have been experiencing an extreme heatwave. Amid intense heatwave conditions in Bihar, on May 29, its state government ordered all private and government-run schools, coaching institutes, and Anganwadi centers to remain closed until June 8. The temperature in Bihar reached a blistering 47 degrees Celsius on May 28, and several school students reportedly were hospitalized due to the intense heat.

Amid such events, a video of a motorcycle catching fire and the flames engulfing a man in the process in the middle of a busy road has been widely circulating on social media with the claim that the incident took place in ​​Darbhanga in Bihar due to extreme heat conditions. 

Sharing the video on X (archived here), a user wrote, “In the sweltering afternoon, a bike caught fire in the most busy area of Donar in ​​Darbhanga. The explosion occurred as soon as the tank was opened to douse the fire with water (translated from Hindi).” This post gained over 93,000 views at the time of publishing this story. An archived version of a similar claim can be viewed here.

Screenshot of a viral claim.(Source: X/Modified by Logically Facts) 

However, the video was not captured in Bihar. It has been available online since 2022 and captures an incident in Maharashtra. 

How did we find out?

A reverse image search on one of the keyframes led us to a video report on YouTube by the Gujarati online news platform 'News Continuous.' This video was shared on April 13, 2022 with the video description stating that the incident took place in Nalasopara town, a suburb of Maharashtra’s capital Mumbai. 

Based on this, we ran a search on Google search using relevant keywords and found a report by India TV on April 13, 2022. The report, which features a screenshot of the viral clip, also reported that the incident took place in Nalasopara and added that two individuals were injured in the incident. 

According to a Hindi news report by NDTV, which carried a screenshot of the viral video, the motorcycle caught fire after it collided with a CNG-run three-wheeler auto rickshaw in Nalasopara West on April 12, 2022. When people tried to douse the fire with water, the fire became dangerously intense after a man opened the fuel tank. The blazing flames also engulfed an auto rickshaw next to it.

Another report by ETV Bharat Maharashtra, which carried the same footage, published on April 12, 2022, noted that the incident took place in front of the Civic Center in Nalasopara West at 4 pm on April 12. It also added that both the vehicles were completely gutted in the fire.

We were able to geolocate the area mentioned in the above mentioned reports on Google Maps. We noticed that the structure of the building and the yellow board seen at the beginning of the viral clip clearly matches the Google Maps location. This conclusively suggests that the video was captured in Nalasopara in Mumbai and not in Bihar, as claimed.

Comparison of a visual from the viral clip with the Google Maps imagery of Nalasopara West. (Source: X/Google Maps/Screenshot)

The verdict

The viral video dates back to April 2022. The incident was captured when a motorcycle reportedly collided with a CNG-run auto-rickshaw in Nalasopara near Mumbai and caught fire with attempts of dousing it only making the flames more intense. The video has been falsely linked to the prevailing heat wave in Bihar.