Old Satellite Visuals Shared as Destruction After Recent Earthquake in Indonesia

The time-lapse is from 2018 & shows a change in the landscape after an earthquake triggered tsunami in the country.

The time-lapse is from 2018 and shows a change in the landscape after an earthquake triggered tsunami in the country.

(Source: Altered by The Quint)

Satellite visuals from the earthquake that hit Indonesia in September 2018 and led to mass destruction of life and property are being shared on social media as the 'latest visuals' from the quake that hit the country on 21 November.

What do the visuals show?: The visuals show how the landscape – which has houses, farmland – was completely changed. A time-lapse of the 'before and after' images is now viral with a claim that insinuates that the visuals are recent.

An archived version of the post can be seen here. 

(Source: Facebook/Screenshot)

(The video has been shared by several users and archived version of the posts can be seen here, here, and here.)

How do you know it is from 2018?: We conducted a search on Google using "satellite images Indonesia earthquake" as the keywords and came across an article published on Maxar, a space technology company, in 2018.

The article was about how the earthquake had triggered a tsunami, which led to soil liquefaction. It used the same two pictures, which have also been used in the time-lapse video.

Comparison between the two images. 

(Source: Maxar/Facebook/Altered by The Quint)

The caption mentioned that it showed the satellite images of Petabo, Palu City, Central Sulawesi, Indonesia.

Any other sources?: We also found news articles about the tsunami and the extend of destruction caused by it. As per an article on Washington Post, published on 2 October 2018, at least 60,000 people fled the city of Palu following the disaster. We also found the same satellite images on Hindustan Times and Geospatial World.

What about the time-lapse video?: In the video, the narrator identifies themselves as 'DAHB07'. We found this time-lapse uploaded on YouTube by a channel called 'DAHB00777' in 2018. We could hear them identifying in a similar manner in several other videos on the channel.

The video was also shared by the head of BNPB, Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, the national agency for disaster counter measure in Indonesia.

What about the recent earthquake in Indonesia?: At least 271 were killed in an earthquake that hit Indonesia's West Java province on 21 November.

The epicentre of the 5.6 magnitude earthquake was near the Cianjur town in West Java – which is around 75 km from the capital, Jakarta.

Conclusion: The video is from Indonesia but shows the satellite imagery of the earthquake that hit the country in 2018.

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