A video is being widely shared claiming that there was a crocodile attack in Debi River in Cuttack, Odisha. The visuals in the video show a crocodile moving in a waterbody with a deceased person in its jaws. Let us fact-check the claim made in the post.
Claim: Video of Crocodile attack in Debi river, Cuttack, Odisha.
Fact: The video is from Tamaulipas, Mexico and not from Odisha. A crocodile attacked and killed a woman on 21 June 2021 when she was allegedly washing her clothes on the shore of Laguna del Carpintero Tampico, Tamaulipas, Mexico. Though crocodiles were spotted recently in Devi River, there are no recent news reports about a deceased woman in the jaws of a crocodile in Devi River. Hence, the claim made in the post is FALSE.
When reverse image search is done on the screenshots of the video, a YouTube video with similar visuals was found. The YouTube video was uploaded on 23 June 2021 by ‘Reynaldo Bernard De Dios De La Cruz’ with the title ‘Crocodile eats a lady’. Even the location of the YouTube video was tagged as ‘Tampico’. Therefore, this video may not have been from Odisha as Tampico is a city in Mexico.
Taking a cue that this video could be from Tampico, we searched Google with relevant keywords and found a video from a website named ‘worldstarhiphop’ with the title ‘Damn: Crocodile Spotted with A Woman in His Mouth Swimming Through a Lake!’ In the description of the video, it says that a crocodile attacked and killed a woman on 21 June 2021 when she was allegedly washing her clothes on the shore of Laguna del Carpintero. Laguna del Carpintero is in Tampico City, Tamaulipas State in Mexico.
We looked for local news articles from Mexico, whether any such incidents of a Woman getting attacked by a crocodile were reported. We found a couple of articles that confirm that this incident had indeed taken place. ‘Numerous area residents witnessed the attack. Videos show the large crocodile coasting through lagoon waters with the deceased woman in its jaws.’ The body of the woman attacked was recovered by officials there. The articles can be seen here and here.
According to various news articles and video reports, crocodiles have been frequently sighted in Devi River in Odisha recently. A video of a 10-feet crocodile in the river went viral recently, which was spotted on 22 July 2021. The people nearby were advised by forest officials not to venture into the river. The video reports can be seen here, here, and here. None of the videos show a woman being attacked by a crocodile. There are no recent news reports about a deceased woman in the jaws of a crocodile in Devi River.
To sum it up, this video of a crocodile attacking a woman is from Mexico, not Odisha.
Update (06 September 2021): The same video is now being shared as being from Ramgarh Taal Lake in Gorakhpur, Uttar Pradesh.
