A video purportedly showing the landing of ‘World’s biggest aircraft Russia AN 225’ in Rio De Janeiro is doing the rounds on social media. The plane is identified as the Antonov-225 plane by an announcer in the viral video. We fact check this claim through this article.
Claim: Visuals of ‘World’s biggest aircraft, Russia AN 225’ in Rio De Janeiro.
Fact: The viral video is actually an animated video shared on Facebook by a gaming video creator on Facebook named ‘Aviation and Games’ and shows Airplane Antonov An-225 Mriya. Hence, the claim made in the post is False.
To check the veracity of the viral claim, we performed a keyword search on the internet, leading us to the original video uploaded on Facebook on 30 January 2024. This was uploaded by a gaming video creator known as ‘Aviation and Games.’ This post’s description reads, ‘Incredible View! Huge Airplane Antonov landing on a short runway.’
‘Aviation and Games’ uploads multiple such 3D animated videos on their page, one of which shows a retired NASA spacecraft space shuttle landing in Las Vegas, USA. These videos are from the ‘Microsoft Flight Simulator’ video game.
The real Airplane Antonov(An-225 Mriya), seen in the gaming video uploaded by ‘Aviation and Games’ was destroyed (here and here) two years ago, at the Antonov Airport in February 2022, when Russia invaded Ukraine. It was the largest plane in the world before its destruction.
Additionally, we found no credible sources showing the landing of Antonov An-225 Mriya in Rio De Janeiro.
To sum up, a gameplay video of the Microsoft Flight Simulator video game is falsely shared as real visuals of the Antonov An-225 Mriya landing on a runway in Rio De Janeiro.
