A clip of waves washing away buildings and swallowing up fields has been viewed hundreds of thousands of times in social media posts that falsely claim it shows a tsunami triggered by a 7.5-magnitude earthquake off Japan’s western coast on January 1, 2024. The clip does show damage caused by a tsunami, but the footage was filmed in Miyagi prefecture after a devastating earthquake and tsunami that struck northeastern Japan in March 2011.
“Tsunami in Japan today,” reads the Thai-language text on a clip posted on TikTok here on January 1, 2024.
The clip, which is captioned “Earthquake in Japan Today”, captures a bird’s eye view of giant waves surging through buildings and across farmland.
Japan’s central Ishikawa prefecture was hit by a 7.5-magnitude earthquake and well over 1,000 aftershocks, some of them registering above 5.0-magnitude, that flattened houses and wrecked infrastructure.
At least 222 people were killed in the disaster, and thousands of survivors continue to live in shelters.
The quake also triggered tsunami waves — with waves at least 1.2 metres (four feet) high at the port of Wajima and three-metre waves recorded at the offline Shika nuclear plant.
Similar posts were shared elsewhere on TikTok here and here, racking up more than 480,000 views.
But the clip does not show a tsunami after the New Year’s Day quake.
Tsunami footage from 2011
A reverse image search on Google using keyframes from the clip led to a corresponding video published by the Associated Press news agency on YouTube here on March 11, 2011 (archived link).
The video is titled, “Raw Video: Tsunami Slams Northeast Japan”. Its description says, “A tsunami triggered by a massive earthquake washed away buildings along the northeast coast of Japan. (March 11)”.
The same footage was also used in a 48-minute long documentary posted by Japanese public broadcaster NHK titled, “3/11 – The Tsunami: The First 3 Days” (archived link).
The documentary was broadcast in January 2021, ahead of the 10-year anniversary of the monster quake of 2011 that triggered a tsunami, left around 18,500 people dead or missing, and caused a nuclear catastrophe at the Fukushima nuclear plant.
The clip used in the false posts corresponds to footage that begins at the documentary’s 17::07 mark, which it says was captured at 3:54pm on March 11, 2011 and aired by NHK News.
At the 18:07 mark, the Japanese narration — which is subtitled in English — says: “Houses are being washed away by the tsunami. Buildings are destroyed. It’s swallowing up the fields too. Cars and houses. Black waves are swallowing up houses and farmland. Near the mouth of the Natori river…”
The Natori river is near Sendai, a city in Miyagi prefecture on Japan’s northeastern coast (archived link).
Below are screenshot comparisons between the clip in the false post (left) and the same footage used in the NHK documentary (right):
AFP has debunked other misinformation related to the latest earthquake in Japan here, here, and here.