Does a video that shows an entire city engulfed in flames as a dozen helicopters hover overhead authentically capture a scene from the Los Angeles wildfires in January 2025? No, that's not true: Multiple online artificial intelligence detectors judged that this video and its audio -- with a lone siren blaring and the crackling sound of fires burning in the background -- was most likely AI generated. Lead Stories has also previously debunked similar claims in January 2025 of videos purporting to show wildfires across Los Angeles and California in 2025 that are actually AI generated videos.
The claim appeared in a post (archived here) on Facebook on January 15, 2025. Above numerous hashtags, the caption opened:
Loss Angeles
This is what the post looked like on Facebook at the time of writing:
(Source: Facebook screenshot taken on Wed. Jan 22 14:39:30 2025 UTC)
The clip, which lasts only a few seconds and then loops to replay over and over, shows a scene where the angle overlooks multiple buildings on fire with smoke billowing and a fleet of helicopters in the sky. The audio is comprised of sounds like fire burning, helicopter blades thumping and a blaring emergency siren.
HIVE Moderation, an online AI detection tool, determined that the video in this post is likely to be 99 percent AI generated.
(Source: HIVE screenshot taken on Wed. Jan 22 14:40:30 2025 UTC)
Lead Stories separated the audio from the video in the post and ran it through the DeepFake-O-Meter audio detector. This AI detection tool, hosted by The University of Buffalo's Media Forensic Lab, found the audio most likely AI generated. Its findings, based on six academic institutions' AI detectors, are displayed below:
(Source: DeepFake-O-Meter screenshot taken on Wed. Jan 22 14:42:30 2025 UTC)
Lead Stories also ran the video through the DeepFake-O-Meter AI video detector. At least one academic institution found this video almost 60 percent likely to be AI generated.
(Source: DeepFake-O-Meter screenshot taken on Wed. Jan 22 14:51:30 2025 UTC)
Additional Lead Stories fact checks regarding the January 2025 wildfires in Los Angeles can be found here.
