Old & Unrelated Photos & Videos Go Viral as Scenes from Jakson Anthony's Motor Accident!

The motor accident of veteran Sri Lanka artist Jackson Anthony , made news headlines last few days, when the cab he along with two others were travelling, had collided with a wild elephant in Thalawa , Anuradhapura.

Large number of social media posts were shared about this accident. This is our investigation regarding an unrelated video which was shared claiming to be dashcam footage of the crash.

Social Media Claims

A video went viral, claiming to be the scenes which got captured in the dashcam of Jakson Anthony’s cab, just before the accident.

Facebook

We also noticed multiple social media posts carrying an image of a wounded elephant alongside prayers for the animal to get well soon. These posts were implying that the image was depicting the elephant which collided with Jackson Anthony's cab.

Facebook | Archived

We decided to do a fact check on these claims.

Fact Check

We watched the viral video and noticed that it carried the logo of Daily Mail. Using reverse image search of the video frames, we were able to locate the original video published on Daily Mail website, as seen below.

In November 2017, the Daily Mail reported that Utai Bittakreu, a 32-year-old forest ranger was driving through Khao Yai National Park, northeast of Bangkok, had collided with a huge wild elephant. The news report can be read via this | Archived.

Even though the pick-up truck was badly damaged, luckily, the elephant as well as the forest officer, Bitdtakreu along with his wife and daughter had escaped the incident with minor injuries. More news reports related with that can be read from here and here.

We checked the mainstream media, whether there were any reports about a dashcam video related with Jackson Anthony's recent accident as well. However, we were not able to find any such media report.

Here is the Factcrescendo Sinhala report on this old and unrelated video being attributed to the recent motor accident involving Jakson Anthony.

We did a reverse image search on viral image of the seriously injured elephant as well found it to be a capture of a critically injured jumbo, after being hit by a train in West Bengal, India on September 27, 2019. After a few hours of struggling, that elephant had passed away and related news with images can be read below.

Protectallwildlifeblog| Archived Link

A social media video related with above mentioned Bengali elephant can be watched here

This particular photograph of an injured elephant has been doing rounds on social media circles in Sri Lanka on several occasions and here is an investigation by AFP from 2021.

Speaking at the weekly Cabinet Media briefing on 5th June, Co-Cabinet Spokesman Mahinda Amaraweera said images of the elephant that collided with veteran actor Jackson Anthony’s vehicle circulating on social media are fake.

He added that the Wildlife Department has dispatched three teams to investigate and report on this matter, however, reports of an elephant with serious injuries had been received yet either, as reported here. | Archived

Here is Factcrescendo Sinhala report on the viral image, shared in a misleading context.

Meanwhile, media report that Jackson Anthony's health condition has gradually been becoming better and currently he is in stable condition .Such media report can be reached from here.

Follow us and stay up to date with our latest fact checks.

Facebook | Twitter |Instagram | Google News