2022 video shared as recent blaze at Delhi’s Ghazipur landfill

What is the claim?

A video has been circulating widely on social media, claiming that it depicts the recent fire at India's biggest garbage landfill in Ghazipur, New Delhi. On April 21, a massive fire broke out at the landfill, spreading rapidly across several sections. 

In light of the fire, the third such event reported from Ghazipur this year, several social media users and news outlets like the Daily Mail, an English news website, uploaded a video of vehicles on the road with a blaze in the background. Daily Mail uploaded the viral video in question to their official YouTube channel on April 23, asserting it to be recent. The title read, "India: Fire breaks out at Delhi' Ghazipur' landfill site." An archived version of the YouTube post is available here.

A user on X (formerly Twitter) sharing the video wrote, "NOW: Massive fire in New Delhi, India at the Ghazipur landfill spewing toxic fumes into the air Ghazipur is one of the largest landfills in the world (sic)." Archived versions of the post and similar others can be found here and here.

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

However, this video is old and unrelated to the recent Ghazipur dumpsite fires.

What did we find?

Logically Facts conducted a reverse image search using keyframes from the viral video and found a social media post from April 2022 showing the exact visuals that are now viral. A user on X, @RAJEEVJAIN4, had shared the video (archived here) on April 26, 2022, with the caption, "Fire breaks out at garbage mound near Mukarba Chowk, Delhi bypass." (Bhalswa landfill is located near Mukarba Chowk in north Delhi.)

A subsequent Google search for "Mukarba Chowk dumpsite fires in April 2022" led us to a video on YouTube published by The Quint (archived here) on April 27, 2022. The video description stated that it shows a big fire at the Bhalswa landfill site, located in the outer north area of Delhi. Fire Department officials confirmed that the fire broke out on April 26, 2022. 

Upon closer inspection, four seconds into the Quint video, we could spot a structure identical to the structure seen in the viral video at the 0:01 timestamp.

Comparison showing the viral video and the YouTube video. (Source: X/Youtube/The Quint)

A Hindustan Times news report from April 26, 2022, had also reported on the landfill fire incident in Bhalswa, North Delhi. The report included a photograph depicting the scene from the landfill fire, and the visuals are similar to the now-viral video.

Screenshot of the article from Hindustan Times. (Source: Hindustan Times)

Ghazipur landfill fire

Initial findings indicated that the April 21 fire at the landfill might have been triggered by methane gas released from the waste reacting with the atmosphere. The fire resulted in substantial air pollution that enveloped parts of the city.

According to media reports, the April 21 fire was the third such incident reported from the Ghazipur landfill. A huge section of the landfill was up in flames on March 28, and another fire erupted on April 9.

The verdict

A 2022 video of a landfill fire at Bhalswa, located in the outer north area of Delhi, has been shared as a recent video showing the Ghazipur landfill fires. Therefore, we have marked this claim as misleading.