Old video shared as people ‘stealing’ water bottles during the 2024 London Marathon

What's the claim?

A video showing a group of people taking packaged water bottles from the roadside has been shared with the claim that it shows scenes from the recent 2024 London Marathon. A Facebook user shared the footage with the caption, "This wasn't highlighted on the BBC, but people were stealing water that was meant for the London marathon runners, last weekend. Why would you steal water, perhaps there was a shortage in that community, who knows." 

Over 53,000 participants were part of the recent London Marathon, held on April 21 this year. The event set a new world record for the largest annual one-day fundraising, with over £67 million ($82 million) raised so far, Reuters reported. Linking the viral clip to the 2024 marathon, one Facebook user wrote, "Water for London marathon runners sunday. Stollen by usual suspects. But they don't show that on BBC do they (sic)?" The video has also gained widespread traction on X (formerly Twitter).

Screenshot of the claims made online. (Source: Facebook/Modified by Logically Facts)

However, the viral clip is not recent and dates back to 2016.

What we found

A reverse image search using the keyframes from the viral video led us to a report by local newspaper News Shopper that covers South East London and North West Kent. The article, published on April 25, 2016, features a clearer version of the now-viral video, which runs for the first 26 seconds. According to the article, a group of individuals were seen taking away complimentary bottles of packaged water left by the roadside for London Marathon participants.

Comparison of the viral clip and the 2016 News Shopper video. (Source: Facebook/News Shopper)

According to another report by Mirror, reacting to the situation in 2016, Hugh Brasher, the event director for London Marathon Events, expressed his disappointment: "It's very disappointing to see water being stolen in this way from the official water stations for our runners."

We also found numerous news reports from local news outlets containing screenshots resembling scenes from the viral video. The BBC also covered the incident of individuals taking water bottles intended for marathon runners. The report noted that the video was recorded after the majority of runners had already crossed Deptford, where the clip was shot.

Logically Facts was also able to geolocate the spot where the clip was shot to Evelyn Street in Deptford. While we could spot several similarities in the scenes from the video in question and recent visuals of Evelyn Streets available on Google Maps, we observed that the bus lane seen in the viral clip has been replaced with a cycle path in all recent Google Street View visuals establishing that the viral video is old.

Evelyn Street in 2016 and 2023. (Source: Google Maps)

No media outlet has reported any similar incident of water being 'stolen' from the London Marathon this year.

The verdict

The video shows people taking complimentary bottles of packaged water meant for 2016 London Marathon participants. The video is not from this year's marathon. Therefore, we have marked this claim as misleading.