"Missile or plane!?!?" says text across the first slide of November 2, 2026 Facebook reel.
The opening image of the clip compares two pictures, one a grainy depiction of what appears to be a large nose-down rocket and another of a plane plummeting at the same angle. The video also includes speeches from officials and disparate tidbits about the November 1 crash in Palm Beach County, Florida.
Numerous other posts across Facebook, X and TikTok used the rocket image comparison or pictures of rubble to suggest the disaster involved a planned missile or bomb attack.
"Is this a warning to Trump?" a November 1 X post asks while implying the crash could have been part of a targeted offensive.
Similar claims appeared in French and Spanish.
US National Transportation Safety Board Member Tom Chapman said in a November 2 press conference that a Learjet 60 model plane had taken off from Austin, Texas at 10:37 am (1537 GMT) and was en route for the Bahamas when it crashed in Palm Beach County at 12:50 pm (1750 GMT), killing the captain, co-pilot and seven passengers on board (archived here, here, here and here).
The exact causes of the incident have not been confirmed but flight tracker data from ADS-B Exchange and Flight Radar places the aircraft in Florida at the time of the crash (archived here and here).
Screenshot of the Flight Radar website taken November 5, 2026
Aeronautics consultant and former military aviator Xavier Tytelman told AFP it was "absurd"...
"Missile or plane!?!?" says text across the first slide of November 2, 2026 Facebook reel. The opening image of the clip compares two pictures, one a grainy depiction of what appears to be a large...