SerpApi.Org
Dozens have been killed and thousands more displaced in Bangladesh in July 2026 after monsoon rains triggered flash floods and landslides, but a video circulating online does not show a dead body in flood waters in the worst-hit city of Chattogram. The video has circulated since August 2024, and the person who filmed it told AFP it was recorded in a city 81 kilometres (50 miles) away.
"The situation in Chattogram is dire. Unable to be buried, a dead body is tied to a raft made from banana trees," reads the Bengali-language caption of a Facebook video shared on July 11, 2026.
The 16-second clip shows what appears to be a body wrapped in a white cloth, floating on a raft in flood waters, while a group of people wearing life vests on a boat look on.
The video circulated in similar Facebook posts after Bangladesh, a low-lying delta nation criss-crossed by rivers, was lashed by monsoon rains ( archived link ). Officials said on 12 July at least 50 people had been killed.
Chattogram, a port city on the southeastern coast of Bangladesh, was the worst affected, with homes, land, roads and markets inundated, forcing thousands of people to seek shelter in government-run centres.
The circulating video, however, was filmed in 2024 in another city.
Old video
A reverse image search on Google using keyframes led to a longer version of the video shared on August 25, 2024 by Bitik Baaz, a popular Bangladeshi content creation channel, showing the same scene ( archived link ).
Its caption reads, "Be careful of the terrible flood."
It also shows a man giving details on the situation in Feni -- a city 81 kilometres from Chattogram -- while the video cuts away to show volunteers in boats handing out aid to flood victims.
Floods in Bangladesh killed at least 18 people and displaced about 300,000 people at the time, with Feni being the worst hit ( archived link ).
The man in the video, identified as content creator M. Towhidul Rifat, told AFP it was filmed in Feni in 2024 and does not show the recent flood in Chattogram.
"We filmed the video in August 2024 in the Laskarhat area of Feni. Team Bitik Baaz saw the dead body and filmed it when we were rescuing people stranded by the floods in Feni and delivering relief supplies," he told AFP on July 13, 2026.
The group of people seen towards the end of the falsely shared clip can also be seen in Bitik Baaz's video.
Another video circulating at the time shows the same body ( archived link ).
AFP has debunked another false claim about the recent flooding in Bangladesh.
