Fake news: Online photo is not of the Maui fires. It's a Canton refinery's flare
A photo circulating on social media that purports to show proof that the Hawaii wildfires were started due to an attack is actually a photo that was taken in Canton Township.
The photo shows a beam of light stretching from the sky to the ground and a glowing fireball on the ground. Social media messages claim the photo shows that Hawaii was attacked, sparking the wildfires that have scorched Maui, reduced buildings to ashes and killed at least 80 people.
But Travis Secrest of Perry Township said he did not take the photo in sunny Hawaii. He took the picture on a brutally cold night in 2018 from Baum Road in Canton Township.
It’s a photo of the Marathon Petroleum refinery’s flame. The refinery on Gambrinus Avenue SW had a controlled flare due to a compressor problem, according to a Canton Repository article at the time. The flare had set off false reports of a fire.
Secrest posted the photo to the Canton Repository Facebook page after the newspaper asked readers to submit photos of the flare.
“There were ice crystals in the air because it was so cold and that flame just reflected like that,” said Secrest, who has never visited Hawaii. “I have lived out there (in Canton Township) all my life. I knew exactly what it was. It just looked incredible because of the ice in the air.”
He said the fireball in the photo was due to the lens of his phone’s camera and the haze that typically surrounds the refinery. The fireball wasn’t actually there.
“It looks much more dramatic in the picture than in real life,” Secrest said.
Secrest, the election systems manager at the Stark County Board of Elections, said this isn’t the first time his photo has been used as part of a conspiracy theory.
“It comes back like a bad penny every two years or so,” said Secrest, who only recalls sharing the video on his personal Facebook page and in the comments of a Repository article about the refinery fire. “I never would have thought that it would be used like this.”
He said the photo often is used with messages labeled as the “absolute proof" that the government is using space lasers or secret weapons. Some messages also have suggested the light is from aliens.
Authorities have said the blazes in Hawaii were fueled by wind from a passing hurricane.
Reach Canton Repository staff writer Kelli Weir at 330-580-8339 or kelli.weir@cantonrep.com.
This article originally appeared on The Repository: Hawaii wildfire conspiracy theory using Stark County photo from 2018
