Fact Check: Mt. Etna Mushroom Cloud Photo Does NOT Document June 2, 2025 Eruption -- Authentic Photo, But From 2015

Fact Check

  • by: Dean Miller
Fact Check: Mt. Etna Mushroom Cloud Photo Does NOT Document June 2, 2025 Eruption -- Authentic Photo, But From 2015 Not 2025

Does a viral post of a white mushroom cloud authentically capture the June 2, 2025 eruption of Mt. Etna? No, that's not true: That image first circulated in 2015. Authentic photos of the 2025 eruption show clouds of a different shape and color, but no symmetrical white mushroom cloud.

The image appeared in a June 3, 2025 Facebook post (archived here) on the travl.wonders page under the title "Mount Etna has erupted 😮".

This is what the post looked like on Facebook at the time of writing:

Etna Post.jpg

(Source: Facebook screenshot taken by Lead Stories)

Identical versions of the image, with the same foreground tree branch, appeared online as early as 2015, (archived here) according to the file-dating protocol on Imgur, an image-hosting site, shown below:

2015Etna.jpg

(Source: Imgur.com screenshot by Lead Stories.)

On the many websites and social media accounts posting their best images of the eruption, no white mushroom appeared in top search results for 2025, as shown below:

GoogEtna2025.jpg

(Source: Google screenshot by Lead Stories.)

Searching Google specifically for "June 2025 Etna mushroom cloud" yielded no such photos, though it did show 2015 photos with discussion of the striking plume that year.

For more Lead Stories fact checks about volcanoes, readers can start here.

Want to inform others about the accuracy of this story?

See who is sharing it (it might even be your friends...) and leave the link in the comments.:


  Dean Miller

Lead Stories Managing Editor Dean Miller has edited daily and weekly newspapers, worked as a reporter for more than a decade and is co-author of two non-fiction books. After a Harvard Nieman Fellowship, he served as Director of Stony Brook University's Center for News Literacy for six years, then as Senior Vice President/Content at Connecticut Public Broadcasting. Most recently, he wrote the twice-weekly "Save the Free Press" column for The Seattle Times. 

Read more about or contact Dean Miller

About Us

EFCSN International Fact-Checking Organization

Lead Stories is a fact checking website that is always looking for the latest false, misleading, deceptive or inaccurate stories, videos or images going viral on the internet.
Spotted something? Let us know!.

Lead Stories is a:


WhatsApp Tipline

Have a tip or a question? Chat with our friendly robots on WhatsApp!

Add our number +1 (404) 655-4223, follow this link or scan the image below with your phone:

@leadstories

Subscribe to our newsletter

* indicates required

Please select all the ways you would like to hear from Lead Stories LLC:

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. For information about our privacy practices, please visit our website.

We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By clicking below to subscribe, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing. Learn more about Mailchimp's privacy practices here.

Most Read

Most Recent

Share your opinion