Artificially-generated video passed off as visuals of Biparjoy

Context

The intensity of cyclone Biparjoy—which forced the evacuation of lakhs of people in Gujarat and southern Pakistan—reduced from 'very severe' category to 'severe' following its landfall in coastal areas of the western Indian state on Thursday evening. The India Meteorological Department (IMD) said the cyclone has moved from sea to land and is currently centered towards Sauarashtra-Kutch. Furthermore, the IMD has forecasted heavy rainfall in Rajasthan today. 

Biparjoy’s advent led to several social media users sharing unrelated videos and linking them to the cyclone. A video featuring a massive tornadic waterspout over the sea has garnered over a hundred thousand views on Twitter and is being shared with the claim that it shows visuals of cyclone Biparjoy.

In Fact

A reverse image search conclusively reveals that the claim is false and that the viral video has been artificially generated. The video in question was originally published on August 9, 2022, on the YouTube channel ‘tsarovvideo’ with the title: "Superior Tornado at the horizon." Upon reviewing the channel, it became evident that its purpose is to create artificial, edited videos depicting "Severe Weather and Natural Disasters."

The channel had shared several other similarly artificially-generated videos featuring storms, volcanoes, and tornadoes. This suggests that the viral video is one of the many computer-generated videos from the channel's collection.

Logically Facts reached out to the owner of the channel, Rostyslav Tsarov. He refuted the viral claim linking the video to Biparjoy and clarified that he was the original creator of the viral video. In his response, he wrote, “Hello, this is my video, and I created it; it's CGI (computer-generated imagery). This video on Twitter was stolen from my channel. It's not a cyclone heading towards India, I created this video one year ago, you can check that on YouTube.”

The Verdict

A CGI video of a tornado was shared as visuals of cyclone Biparjoy. The viral video was created by YouTube user and visual effects artist Rostyslav Tsarov. Therefore, we mark the claim false.