A video is being shared on social media claiming to show the trial run of the world’s highest railway track on the Udhampur-Srinagar-Baramulla rail link (USBRL) on the Chenab River in Jammu and Kashmir. The video shows a train passing through a railway bridge at a high altitude. Let’s verify the claim made in the post.
Claim: Visuals of trial run of the world’s highest railway track on the Udhampur-Srinagar-Baramulla rail link on the Chenab River in Jammu and Kashmir conducted on 21 March 2023.
Fact: The viral video circulating on social media claiming to show the Chenab Bridge in Jammu and Kashmir is actually a video of the Beipanjiang Railway Bridge in Guizhou province, China. Further, on 26 March 2023, the Indian Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw inspected the Chenab Rail Bridge and participated in the Trolley run. Hence the claim made in the post is FALSE.
We performed a reverse image search using the keyframes from the viral video and found the same video posted on Facebook on 27 June 2022 identified as the Beipan River Bridge in Guizhou Province of China. Furthermore, it is important to note that the track-laying work on the Chenab Railway Bridge only began in February 2023. Therefore, the video doesn’t show the trial run on the Chenab Bridge.
We conducted a comparison of the viral visuals with other visuals of the Beipanjiang Railway Bridge and found a match. The landscape of the mountains, the reddish-orange arch of the bridge, the river flowing under the bridge, and the pillars of the bridge were consistent with each other. This confirms that the viral video is indeed showing the Beipanjiang Railway Bridge in China, and not the Chenab Railway Bridge in Jammu and Kashmir as claimed.
On 26 March 2023, the Indian Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw inspected the Chenab Rail Bridge and participated in the Trolley run. The Chenab Rail Bridge is a steel and concrete arch bridge that connects Bakkal and Kauri, located just 42 kilometres from the main Reasi town in the Reasi district of Jammu and Kashmir, India. At a height of 359 meters (1,178 feet) above the Chenab River, the bridge is currently the world’s highest rail bridge. The bridge is expected to open to rail traffic by December 2023 or by January/February 2024. Visuals of the Chenab Rail Bridge can be seen here.
To sum it up, the viral video of a train passing through a railway bridge claimed to be the Chenab Railway Bridge is, in fact, the Beipan River Shuibai Railway Bridge in China.
