claim: The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration reported that Hurricane Irma had airlifted several sharks.
origin: In early September 2017, Hurricane Irma, one of the strongest storms in recorded history, hit several Caribbean islands, causing massive damage and killing at least 13 people. The destruction was not dramatic enough for some, however, as a doctored image showing a purported news ticker reading â€œIrma Now Contains Sharks,â€ sur on social media: This image, of course, is fake.Â The fake news ticker was digitally added as a joke about theÂ SharknadoÂ sci-fi movie series. Judging by the easily-missed watermark in the upper-right corner of the image, it was likely created onÂ BreakYourOwnNews.com,Â a web site thatÂ allows usersÂ to generate their own fake newsÂ images. The image of the hurricane itself, however, is real. It was taken by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and truly shows the massive size of Hurricane Irma as it churned in the Atlantic Ocean on the morning of 5 September 2017: < In this geocolor image captured by GOES-16 and released by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Hurricane Irma, a potentially catastrophic category 5 hurricane, moves westward, Tuesday morning, Sept. 5, 2017, in the Atlantic Ocean toward the Leeward Islands. This image was captured as daylight moves into the area, right, with nighttime features on the left side of the image. Hurricane Irma grew into a dangerous Category 5 storm, the most powerful seen in the Atlantic in over a decade, and roared toward islands in the northeast Caribbean Tuesday on a path that could eventually take it to the United States. (NOAA via AP) > With sites likeÂ BreakYourOwnNews.com, users can make wild claims look real. As an experiment, we used the web site for our own purposes:Â Although there have been reports of tornados lifting (and later dropping) various animals, the scenario depicted in theÂ SharknadoÂ series, where a tornado causes dozens of great white sharks to rain from the sky, isÂ far-fetched.Â