No, this video does not depict the wreckage of the lost US F-35 jet. Instead, it shows the remains of a Russian plane that was shot down by Ukrainian Air Defense. - iVerify Kenya

No, this video does not depict the wreckage of the lost US F-35 jet. Instead, it shows the remains of a Russian plane that was shot down by Ukrainian Air Defense.

False

The shared video depicts the wreckage of a Russian aircraft, specifically a Su-34 fighter-bomber, which was shot down over Kharkiv, a city located in northeast Ukraine, by the Ukrainian Air Defense in March 2022.

On September 17, 2023, the United States military made an urgent appeal to the public for assistance in locating a missing F-35 fighter jet. The aircraft had become disoriented and was lost following a mishap, prompting the Marine Corps pilot in command to eject. The search operation for the missing fighter jet was concentrated in the vicinity of Lake Moultrie and Lake Marion, situated to the north of North Charleston in South Carolina.

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Verified Sep, 20 2023

Claim

Video capturing debris from the F-35 found in Williamsburg County, South Carolina

Rating Justification

The iVerify Network of Fact-Checking Desks has fact-checked this content and established that it is False.

To arrive to this conclusion, the iVerify Network of Fact-Checking Desks has conducted the following process. A reverse search has unveiled that the images depicting the wreckage of the Russian aircraft were initially disseminated in a tweet on March 7, 2022, by Ukraine Weapons Tracker. This tweet included photographs featuring the aircraft’s tail number, RF-95070, thereby confirming that the aircraft that had been brought down was indeed a Su-34.

We have also come across an article published by Air Live, a website renowned for its aviation news and services. According to this source, the Russian Su-34 fighter-bomber was reportedly downed over Kharkiv on March 6, 2022. Kharkiv is situated in the northeastern part of the country and holds the distinction of being the largest city in the historic region of Sloboda Ukraine.

A reverse image search of the keyframes from the video has uncovered that it was originally posted on X by NEXTA, an Eastern European media outlet, on March 7. This video depicts the aftermath of the downing of a Russian aircraft, specifically the Su-34 fighter-bomber, by Ukrainian Air Defense forces near Kharkiv.

Subsequently, on the evening of September 18, debris from the F-35 fighter jet was located in rural South Carolina, marking a significant development in the ongoing search efforts.

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