Fact Check: Do these videos show crows flocking to Wuhan where Corona virus originated?

Hyderabad: Following the outbreak of Corona virus in Wuhan, China, many strange claims are doing the rounds on social media. Some strange videos have gone viral in the past few days. One such video shows flocks of flying crows. It is being claimed that the crows are flying above the skies of Wuhan, where the virus is said to have originated.

One user shared the video stating, "How come there are so many crows in Wuhan?"

This video has also been uploaded on Youtube with the title "THE BIRDS! IN WUHAN VERY SCARY SIGN"

Another Twitter user claimed, "I have seen several videos reporting flocks of crows in Wuhan and other areas of China that are being impacted by the #coronavirus (sic)."

The video is also going viral on Facebook. A post claimed, "A truly disturbing number of crows have descended into Wuhan, China... what could be attracting so many? Hundreds of people die all the time. Their city is bigger than New York... No what's happening here is much bigger and much darker."

Another similar video, claiming that crows are migrating to Wuhan is also going viral. People have uploaded this video on various platforms such as Youtube claiming it is from Wuhan.

Fact Check:

Newsmeter extracted keyframes from both videos and performed a reverse image search on Google. The reverse image search for the first video fetched results from Weibo, where a Chinese media outlet named Pear had posted a video.

The description on Weibo, when translated into English, read, "February 9, 2020. Xining, Qinghai. The guy Huayi posted a video of a group of crows flying near Wencheng Road, which attracted his attention. He said that he moved to live there last September, and this has been the situation since the beginning of winter. He was walking at about 7 p.m. He said it was black and horrible, which was a bit scary but also beautiful."

https://www.weibo.com/5999393944/ItKQJrVrI?refer_flag=1001030103_&type=comment

We also found a video report in express.co.uk which confirms that this video is from Wusi road in Xining City in Qinghai Province.

https://www.express.co.uk/videos/6131540343001/China-Flock-of-crows-swarms-road-in-Xining-City

Search for the second video using keyframes led us to a video on Youtube with the title, "Crows circling the sky in Jingzhou city (next to Wuhan) - Are they attracted by the smell of death?"

Many Twitter users shared the above link confirming that it is from Jingzhou city of Hubei province. Though Jingzhou city is in Hubei province, it is 223 km away from Wuhan.

Therefore, the claims that these two videos show crows flying over Wuhan are FALSE. Though they are recent videos from different Chinese cities, they are NOT from Wuhan.