Footage of Crimea bridge explosion misrepresented as Baltimore bridge collapse

After a cargo ship collided with a Maryland bridge, social media users shared footage of the incident, including one video that misleadingly shows a fiery explosion.

A March 26 Instagram reel sharing a TikTok video begins with a person pointing at a screen that shows real footage of the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapsing into the Patapsco River in Baltimore.

The person in the video then claims “explosions” caused the bridge to collapse, saying, “They demolished the bridge, people. Wake the f— up. Distraction story again.”

The Instagram reel switches to different video footage that appears to show an alternate angle of the bridge collapse. In this clip, cars are seen driving across the bridge before an explosion happens and smoke and flames engulf the structure.

(Screengrab from Instagram)

A Facebook post also shared a video of this explosion, claiming it happened on the Baltimore bridge.

These posts were flagged as part of Meta’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram.)

This explosion footage is unrelated to the Baltimore bridge. A reverse-image search using Google Images showed the footage is from an October 2022 explosion on the Kerch bridge, which connects Russia to Crimea. CNN, The Guardian and other news outlets published this video when reporting on the 2022 incident.

The March 26 Baltimore bridge collapse was triggered when a 985-foot-long cargo ship plowed into one of the bridge’s supports at about 1:30 a.m., causing the rest of the bridge to collapse into the water. There have been no credible reports of an explosion at the time of the collapse.

Federal and Maryland officials said they do not think the container ship’s crash into the bridge’s support column was intentional.

“There is no specific or credible information to suggest there are ties to terrorism in this incident,” said William J. DelBagno, the special agent in charge of the FBI’s Baltimore field office, during a March 26 press conference.

Gov. Wes Moore, D-Md., shared the same sentiment earlier in the briefing.

President Joe Biden said during a different March 26 press conference that “we have no other indication, no other reason to believe there is any intentional act here.”

We rate the claim that video footage shows an explosion on the Baltimore bridge Pants on Fire!