Viral ship fire video is old, unrelated to reported strikes near UAE: fact check

ISLAMABAD: A video widely circulated on social media with claims that it showed a cargo ship set ablaze near the United Arab Emirates after an attack by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps is in fact old footage from an unrelated maritime fire off India’s coast, according to a fact check originally published by iVerify Pakistan, a project of CEJ-IBA and UNDP.

The fact check said multiple accounts, including Iranian media, had shared the clip since Monday across several platforms while linking it to the latest regional tensions. The footage was presented as showing a vessel hit near the UAE, but verification found that the video predated the current developments and had no connection to them.

On Monday the UAE said it had been targeted by Iranian strikes, including one on the Fujairah energy hub, where three Indians were wounded. Fujairah lies beyond the Strait of Hormuz and is considered one of the few Middle Eastern oil export routes that does not require passage through the strait.

According to the fact check, Iran’s state television network said military officials had confirmed attacks on the UAE in response to what it described as the US military’s adventurism. The attacks ended a period of relative calm in the UAE after a Pakistani-mediated ceasefire between Washington and Tehran took effect on April 8, pausing more than a month of fighting in the Gulf region.

How the video was shared

The fact check said Iranian media outlet Fars News posted the video on its official Telegram account on Monday without identifying the vessel’s nationality. The caption read:

Image attributed to one of the ships that was hit near the UAE.

The post received 17,000 likes.

Another account shared the same clip on X with the caption:

Iran State TV Fars claims: Image attributed to one of the ships that was struck in the vicinity of the UAE

According to the fact check, that post drew 116,000 views.

A further post on X identified the vessel in the footage as HMM Namu, describing it as a South Korean cargo ship and stating:

The ship in the footage: HMM Namu, a South Korean cargo vessel operated by HMM shipping, Engine room fire broke out while anchored in the Strait of Hormuz near the UAE. 24 crew on board. 6 South Koreans, 18 other nationals, no casualties reported. Cause officially under investigation.

The fact check said that post received 215,000 views. The same video was also circulated by several users on Instagram and X, where the posts together accumulated 135,000 views.

Verification findings

To assess the claim, the fact check said a keyword search was carried out to see whether any credible international media organisations had reported that the IRGC struck a cargo ship near the UAE. No such reports were found.

A reverse image search then traced the clip to an X post shared by India Today on July 19, 2024. The post carried the caption:

A major fire broke out on a container merchant cargo vessel about 102 nautical miles south-west of Goa on Friday. The vessel was on passage from Mundra to Colombo, Sri Lanka. Upon receiving the information about the fire, the Indian Coast Guard immediately diverted an ICG ship to proceed to attend to the distress call and reach the vessel as soon as possible

The fact check said further searches found the same footage posted by The Times of India on the same day, linking it to a fire aboard a cargo vessel off Goa, where the Indian Coast Guard was conducting firefighting operations.

Keyword searches also produced multiple reports from Indian media outlets, including The Times of India, NDTV, The Hindu and The Indian Express, all describing the same July 2024 ship fire and carrying visuals matching the viral clip.

The fact check concluded that the claim was false and that the footage showed a cargo vessel fire off Goa in July 2024, not a ship struck near the UAE in the latest escalation.