Does a real, sharp photo that went viral on social media actually show the Learjet that crashed in Palm Beach, Florida, on Nov. 1, 2026? No, that’s not true: The image, which shows the plane with a missing wing, a deformed engine without its cowling and a bent tail, appears to have been edited using AI tools from OpenAI. A detection tool found a SynthID watermark in the image consistent with AI modification or generation, and screenshots from video of the crash do show both wings.
The image appeared in a post on X (archived here) where it was published on Nov. 1, 2026 by an account named “Tiffany Savage.” The text in the post read
Is there a wing missing? Also, the engine cowling on the right is missing.
This is the image that appeared in the post:
Image source: post by @patriot_savvy on X.
The SynthID Content Detection Tool hosted by Google detected the invisible digital watermark developed by Google DeepMind (archived here). The watermarking system is used by AI tools from various SynthID partner platforms: Nvidia, OpenAI, Google and Kakao. In this case, the detection tool confirmed that the image was “made or edited” with tools from OpenAI (archived here).
Image source: screenshots of detection results on SynthID.com.
AI-enhanced images of current events frequently distort or invent details, as previous fact checks by Lead Stories have demonstrated.
In the current case, a real dashcam video of the crash of a Learjet 60 in Palm Beach County (archived here) was apparently screenshotted and “cleaned up” with AI tools. The video, attributed to “Aki Kuusisto,” does appear to show both wings when the frame is frozen just a tiny bit later:
Image source: screenshot of Aki Kuusisto video posted on YouTube by 10 Tampa Bay News.