Yep, it looks fake. For one thing they’re not really running “away”, so much as running off to the side of it.
It seems like there should be debris between the people and the wave.
And the bottom of the picture looks fuzzy. I’m not sure what that means, except it doesn’t look right.
Well what it does remind me of is what it looks like when a storm surge strikes a very strong vertical wall and the wave gets thrust upwards and forms a ball of foamy water. So even though it looks big it may bemostly water. Doesn’t it remind you of shots you’ve seen on America’s Funniest Home Videos or from some reporter reporting on a hurricane coming in?
Probably they were there watching the huge waves ending far enough away from them so that they felt safe and then here comes this huge one which knocks them all down.
"Huge tides occured as Typhoon Sinlaku swept the southern part of the East China Sea at 5:00 a.m. since last Saturday, with the maximum wind force of 40 meters per second. "
It looks to me like a genuine pic, but one that was taken with a very long telephoto lens. These have the effect of “compressing” the distance between objects, making it look as though the wave is much closer to the people. (This site has a good explanation and example images.) More evidence of this effect can be seen in the background at the top of the image - buildings which are presumably on the far side of the river also look quite close by.
I agree with what r_k has to say about a telephoto lens. The “flatness” of the overall image and the sharpness of the foreground compared to the windows of the building way in behind do suggest a long lens (or a small aperture, but for speedy action I can’t imagine anyone trying the shot with a small aperture).
The cameraman/woman was probably quite a distance away.
The blurred bits in the foreground are quite puzzling and I kind of find them a little suspicious, but then I’ve had a similar effect in my photos from resting the lens on something, like my jacket on a wall, for stability when I didn’t have a tripod. It could also be from movement right in front of the camera (like if the cameraman/woman was shooting just over someone’s head.)
The shadows at the lower part of the wave seem consistent with the shadows of the runners.
Since it’s cropped vertically, I have a huge suspicion that we aren’t getting the whole story. It may be a huge splash between concrete abutments or something.
If you zoom in in photoshop, they runners don’t look quite as frightened (granted, it’s quite pixelated), and I don’t get the impression that they are in mortal danger. (The three in the foreground facing the camera, two dressed in black, one in yellow, almost look like they’re laughing.)
So I’m guessing there is some kind of dam or barrier, and a huge wave smashed into it throwing water up in a foamy mess that then came crashing down. It’s definitely cropped to give it a much more dramatic effect and I bet if we saw the whole frame the photo would explain itself.
Look at the photo again, starfish. The man to which I think you’re referring isn’t sitting with his arms crossed over his knees. If you’re speaking of the man in the lower right, his forearm is front of another man’s legs, at the knees. He’s running.
If this isn’t the man to which you’re referring, just ignore me.
No offense to anyone, to be sure, but I have noticed that in many parts of the world common “safety” sense seems to be in pretty short supply. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a huge surge coming in and a bunch of ya-hoos are caught standing around watching it, and only realize when its too late that they are about to be washed away. Just look at everytime it floods somewhere. There is always one idiot who thinks they can drive across the road, and ends up dead.
I vote for ligit photo, and dimwitted “victims”.
You don’t need a weatherman to tell you not to stand in the rain.
Boy we’re a suspicious bunch. How many times has this exact senario been on one of those funniest videos shows or when CNN sends there correspondants to Puerto Rico or South Carolina to report on some hurricane hitting? I can think of several off hand. And those news organazations always show footage of the surge striking some wall and blooming into a great puff of spume. And also remember that a fear face is remarkably similar to a happy face.
I’ve seen a very similar thing on TV, complete with rescue efforts for the spectators who ended up in the water. IIRC, the storm surge was funneled between two jetties and broke against a sea wall with a lot of force.
I’ll agree that the photo looks questionable, but I do remember seeing video a few years ago of some Chinese (I think) outrunning a river bore that had overflowed its levee. Perhaps this was taken from that. . .
The photo in the OP was published in the “Metro” newspaper here in London a few days ago, along with a similar text (but without the “flee” in quotes).
When I saw the picture in the newspaper I did think it looked a little odd, but as has already been mentioned, it could be to do with the way it was shot.
I think it is a genuine photo, based on the fact that it has been published on both yahoo and in a completely unrelated newspaper.
It was a tidal bore on the Qiantang River in China. The bore is a surge that comes up the mouth of the river at known times during the lunar cycle, and there is a long tradition of gathering to watch it. The storm made this one worse, though, and people went against the warnings to watch it anyway.
Articlefrom the Shanghai Star, 12 September 2002. (The site looks legit, but Anna Kournikova is on the front page, which raises some red flags about their journalism cred.) China tourism site with a picture of the bore. (Scroll down about halfway.) Fluid mechanics page with another picture of the bore, and the people watching it.
Hmmm, I usually equate typhoons with clouds and dark skies and not shadows.
Easily could be a photo from the tidal bore. I haven’t seen it myself, but watched a Japanese document about it a few years ago and watched a few bystanders get swept away.
