Viral video shows amusement park ride in Italy, not UFO | Fact check

Eleanor McCrary, USA TODAY
·2 min read

The claim: Video shows UFO in Chile

A May 4 Facebook post (direct link, archive link) shows grainy footage of what appears to be a saucer-like shape hovering in the sky.

"Ufo appeared in a small town in Chile," reads the post's caption. "Hundreds of people were present to witness."

The video was viewed more than 8,000 times in one week. The same video was posted to Twitter on May 3 and has been viewed over 90,000 times in eight days.

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Our rating: False

This video actually shows a distorted view of an amusement park ride at Gardaland Resort in Verona, Italy.

Video shows 'Flying Island' park ride

The dark, saucer-like shape in the video has been distorted and misidentified.

Older versions of the same video found on YouTube show the saucer-like shape as being more circular, indicating that the Facebook version of the video has been distorted. Other videos similarly claim the video shows a UFO from a variety of other countries, including Italy, Russia and Norway.

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But the video actually shows the "Flying Island" amusement park ride at the Gardaland Resort in Verona, Italy.

A video by YouTube user Gardaland Plus shows "Flying Island" at night. The ride matches the shape of the unedited versions of the video, down to the slight triangular indentation on the far right-hand side. Surrounding the bottom of the ride are lights grouped in threes. The same distinctive pattern is on the bottom of the purported "UFO" in the video.

USA TODAY reached out to the social media user who shared the post and the amusement park but did not immediately receive a response.

The claim has also been debunked by Reuters.

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: UFO-shaped object from ride in Italy, not sky in Chile | Fact check