Image does not show an alligator swimming in a Florida home after Hurricane Ian
Image does not show an alligator swimming in a Florida home after Hurricane Ian
(Reuters) - An image shared on social media purports to show an alligator in a Florida home, with some posts on social media saying it was after Hurricane Ian. But the image has been digitally manipulated using a photo of a crocodile in Australia.
One user who posted the photo said, “My Partna in Florida sent me this and said he woke up and came downstairs and the gator was looking at him just like this (sic)” (here). More examples of the altered image can be found (here), (here) and (here).
The digitally added image of the animal in its original form can be found in a Daily Mail article (here) about Brutus, a 100-year-old dominant crocodile with three limbs (here).
The Daily Mail credits Adelaide River Cruises for the photo (here), a river tour company based in the Northern Territory of Australia.
Karen Kershaw of Adelaide River Cruises confirmed to Reuters that the company believes the image circulating on social media is “absolutely photoshopped.”
Adelaide River Cruises said it originally posted the since-deleted image on Facebook of Dominator (not Brutus), a nearly 20-foot, 85-year-old male crocodile. “I can definitely confirm that the crocodile in the photo is one of ours,” Kershaw said. “We know every crocodile in our part of the river.”
The photo does not show an alligator in Florida after Hurricane Ian. While it is unclear where the manipulated photo originated, AFP Fact Check reported that users have falsely connected it to other weather events in the past (here).
VERDICT
Altered. The image has been digitally manipulated using a photo of a crocodile in Australia.
