Fact Check Video Fact-Check International

Incident of worm rain in China is false

March 22, 2023 2:23 PM

Recently, a video circulating on the internet claiming that worms fall with the rain in China under the title that ‘Rain of worms’ floods Beijing.

See some related articles published in various international media: New York Post (USA), Daily Star UK (UK), The Mirror (UK), 7News Australia (AU), The Jerusalem Post (Israel), Bay.com (Malta), fm96 (Fiji), Times of India (India), Hindustan Times (India).

Check out some Twitter posts with the same claim here (archive), here (archive), here (archive), and here (archive).

Factcheck

Rumor Scanner team has found that the video claiming that millions of worms fall with rain in Beijing, China is false. Actually the scene is captured from poplar trees flowers falling in Liaoning province, northern China.

What is seen in the video?

An analysis of the video claiming that millions of worms fall with the rain shows that the objects shown in the video are only visible on a few cars lined up. Even if a pedestrian with an umbrella walked by the nearby roads, cars or other structures nothing like that was seen there.

In addition, some reflections of trees can be seen in the mirrors of cars. Besides, the incident mentioned in the title of the video is an incident in Beijing, China.

However, in the comment box of this video circulated on Twitter, a Chinese journalist named Shen Shiwei commented on March 10 that he is in Beijing, the video is fake. No such rain event occurred in Beijing.

Later, a report titled ‘The US media said that China was attacked by “worm rain”, take a closer look…‘ was found on the website of the Chinese news media Sina on March 11. According to this report, on March 10, the US media New York Post reported based on a video spread on social media that China has experienced a biological disaster. In the video, small insects are scattered everywhere and people are using umbrellas to escape from them.

Following the New York Post‘s claim, Sina said the video was circulated in China late last month and that what the New York Post is referring to as a biological disaster is nothing more than poplar flowers and is a very common phenomenon in China.

In addition, a video titled ‘The spikes of poplar flowers in Benxi, Liaoning are all over the roof of the car‘ can be found on March 1 on China video sharing platform Douyin.

Screenshot: Chinese Video Sharing Platform Douyin

According to the detailed description of the video, the roof of the car was covered in poplar flower spikes in Benji, Liaoning Province. This video is similar to the video claiming that millions of worms fall with the rain.

Besides, by checking the comment box of the videos circulating on Twitter demanding that millions of worms fall with the rain, many Chinese citizen’s comments were found in this regard. They termed the claim of worms falling with the rain as false and said that these are poplar flowers lying on the car. This is seen every spring in northern China.

By the way, spring is the time when poplar flowers bloom in China.

See more about poplar flowers and trees here.

Basically, spring in China is when poplar flowers bloom. At this time the poplar flower spikes fall. Recently, the US media New York Post published a report entitled “China pummeled by ‘rain of worms’ as residents asked to carry umbrellas” with such a video recorded in the case of poplar flower spikes falling on top of cars in Liaoning Province, northern China. Later, based on this report, the news about the claim started to be circulated in various foreign media. However, according to Rumor Scanner, there has been no incident of millions of worms falling with the rain in China.

So, a video is being circulated on many international media including social media claiming that millions of worms fall with the rain in China; Which is completely false.