Does a video circulating on social media in October 2024 show a Florida bridge jammed with cars during Hurricane Milton? No, that's not true: The clip shows vehicles backed up on a bridge in Mumbai, India -- not Florida. It appeared on social media during Mumbai's floods in September 2024.
The claim appeared in video on TikTok (archived here) on October 9, 2024, with the caption "People stuck on a bridge in a traffic jam in Florida. 🙏🏽🙏🏽" The title on the video read:
People Are STUCK On Bridges During Hurricane Milton 😱 🙏
This is what the post looked like on TikTok at the time of writing:
(Source: TikTok screenshot taken on Thu Oct 10 16:55:48 2024 UTC)
A Google Lens reverse image search (archived here), shows that the same video appeared in a post on Instagram (archived here) on September 25, 2024 -- about 10 days before Milton officially became a hurricane off the coast of North America. Its Hindi-language caption reads "Mumbai ki Barish," which translates to English as "Mumbai rain," according to Google Translate (archived here).
Torrential rains pounded Mumbai on the day the video appeared on Instagram, bringing much of the city to a standstill, according to a report by Reuters (archived here). The caption on the Instagram clip reads "WESTERN EXP HIGHWAY," referring to the Western Express Highway, a major traffic artery in Mumbai.
Other Lead Stories fact checks of claims about Hurricane Milton can be read here; our fact checks of claims about other 2024 hurricanes are here. More Lead Stories fact checks of claims about weather can be found here.
