Forward or Delete: This Week's Fake Viral Photos
Occasionally, against all odds, you’ll see an interesting or even enjoyable picture on the Internet. But is it worth sharing, or just another Photoshop job that belongs in the digital trash heap? Check in here and find out if that viral photo deserves an enthusiastic “forward” or a pitiless “delete.”
DELETE
As wildfires race across the West, this striking photo of a “highway to Hell” has been attributed to a number of different blazes currently raging in California, Oregon and Colorado.
In reality, however, the photo was taken by Adventure magazine reader Troy C. Whitman in 2003.
“It was the first place the fire crossed north of the Highway as it headed toward the communities surrounding Lake Arrowhead, [California],” wrote Whitman in 2004. “An ABC News van was completely demolished. The fire melted all of their equipment. Molten aluminum was running down the road. Remarkably, no one was injured.”
FORWARD
$6 asparagus water might sound like an absurd parody of Whole Foods hucksterism, but the above photo shows an actual product that could be found this week on one of the supermarket’s shelves.
“It was meant to be water with the essence of vegetables and/or mushrooms to be used as broth (similar to a bone broth), which are typically made over a long period of time soaking in water,” confirmed a Whole Foods spokesperson responding to the photo and the resulting veggie-infused wave of criticism. “The product was made incorrectly and has since been removed from the one store where it was carried.”
DELETE
This image posted by popular photo account @History_Pics on Wednesday has all the elements of a great internet story (pizza, history and annoying rude dudes), so it’s hardly surprising it blew up on Twitter this week. Unfortunately, that story happens to be false.
Not only was pizza a relative novelty in America until after World War II, the original scan of the photo is captioned “Pie eating contest at Tidal Basin bathing beach,” a dish that can be clearly seen in a full-sized version of the photo.
Image via Twitter//h/t @PicPedant/Snopes
FORWARD
On Saturday, this photo of a cartoonish police encounter went viral on Reddit bearing the title “They’ve been looking for him for 10 minutes.”
As a police spokesperson later confirmed, the photo shows a real domestic disturbance call that occurred in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
“When police first arrived, no one answered the door,” the Detroit Free Press reports. “After some time, they were able to locate a suspect on the roof of the home.”
DELETE
I’m sorry, but this is honestly one of the dumbest hoaxes I’ve ever heard, is apparently more than 10 years old, and still was all over Facebook this week. In case you don’t understand why this scenario is completely impossible, Forbes explains:
The size an object appears in the sky depends on how big it is and how far away it is. The Moon is pretty close to Earth: 240,000 miles (384,000 km), which is practically on top of us in astronomical terms. By contrast, Mars and Earth will never get closer to each other than about 34 million miles (55 million kilometers).
[...]
Mars is roughly twice the diameter as the Moon, so for Mars to appear to be the same size as the Moon, it would need to get to about 500,000 miles away from us — something like 700 times closer than it can ever get.
“Disappointed? Don’t be,” wrote NASA when they debunked this claim over a decade ago. “If Mars did come close enough to rival the Moon, its gravity would alter Earth’s orbit and raise terrible tides.”
So maybe you won’t be able to see Arnold Schwarzenegger’s exploding head with your naked eye, but at least we won’t be drowning which is cool.
