Does a video show two active tornadoes on the ground simultaneously in Florida during Hurricane Milton's landfall in October 2024? No, that's not true: The video on X shows two active tornadoes on the ground simultaneously in Nebraska in 2014. The person who made the video confirmed that the tornado sightings were recorded in Pilger, Nebraska, in 2014 in a 2020 X post and a 2024 Instagram post.
The image appeared in a post (archived here) on X on October 9, 2024. Above a video posted by social media user Concerned Citizen, the caption opened:
Two Tornadoes 🤯
It's been reported multi-numerous Tornadoes today across Florida, estimates of over 50+
When has this ever happened before?
This is what the claim looked like on X at the time of writing:
(Source: X screenshot taken on Thu Oct 10, 15:52:59 2024 UTC)
Although the post did not mention Hurricane Milton specifically, it was posted the same day that the hurricane made a nighttime landfall in Florida.
A Google reverse image search (archived here) led Lead Stories to a June 16, 2014, WLUK/Fox 11 News article titled "Tornadoes flatten tiny rural Nebraska town; 2 dead," which displayed the exact video of the two active tornadoes making landfall about a mile from one another. The caption underneath the video in this article says that this rare event occurred on June 16, 2014, in Pilger, Nebraska.
The article led Lead Stories to Ricky Forbes, the storm chaser who recorded the video seen in the post. In a July 19, 2024, Instagram post (archived here) on Forbes's verified Instagram account, the exact video of the twin tornadoes seen in the X post is displayed. In the caption of Forbes's Instagram post, he confirms when and where this recording of the extreme weather event took place:
'We got TWINS?!'🌪️🤯🌪️
Still hard to believe this happened. This looked just like a scene straight out of the @twistersmovie.
We called in the warnings and did everything we could to get the word out. This was the terrifying and tragic day of the Pilger, Nebraska, twin EF4 tornadoes in 2014.
Forbes also published this recording of the tornadoes on his verified X account in a February 5, 2020, post (archived here). The caption of this post also confirms when and where Forbes recorded this video:
In real time these moments go quickly. In the heat of the moment it seems to last forever. 😲🌪️
Close encounter with a pair of tornadoes in '14 in NE. As the driver, you are responsible for the team's safety... it can be really terrifying to keep moving forward.
#TornadoHunters
Additional Lead Stories fact checks mentioning Hurricane Milton can be read here.
More Lead Stories fact checks about claims from the X user Concerned Citizen can be read here.
