Fact Check: Lufthansa pilot was not fired for failing to activate chemtrail spray, it is a satire
Airplane contrails are line-shaped clouds that form behind jet aircraft engines when water vapor in the exhaust condense
Claim :
Lufthansa pilot who refused to activate chemtrail spray was fired from his jobFact :
The video is satirical, no such incident has been reported recently
Airplane contrails are line-shaped clouds that form behind jet aircraft engines when water vapor in the exhaust condenses into ice crystals. These airplane contrails, or the white streaks of water vapor left in the sky from planes, have been the subject of conspiracy theories for decades. Some believe they are made up of chemicals purposefully sprayed by the government, the wealthy, or some mix of the two, secreting toxic chemicals into the air, creating the white lines. Ideas about the purpose of these supposed toxic chemicals vary. Some believe the chemicals are being used to poison humanity, others say it’s for mind control, and some think it’s a way for the government to control the weather.
Amidst these theories, a social media post has come into circulation claiming that Lufthansa fired its pilot and took him to labor court in Germany for not switching on the chemtrail system. The pilot Christoph W was fired in May 2023 without notice after the employer discovered that during a flight from Frankfurt to Barcelona, W failed to activate the switch to activate the chemtrail spray process once the place was at cruising altitude. The pilot admitted that he had not switched on the chemtrail system on more than 30 intra-European flights. The posts share a video which is in the German language with a caption.
The archive links of the claims can be found here, here.
Fact Check:
The claim is False. No Lufthansa pilot was fired, the video comes from a satirical website.
The chemtrail conspiracy theory has persisted for several decades now, where people allege that the government authorities or other powerful people are spraying toxic chemicals through airplanes in order to control the weather or control the human mind. These conspiracy theories have been debunked multiple times.
The ice crystals that form when the exhaust gases containing water vapor flow out of the aircraft engines and hit cold air are called Contrails. They usually form at altitudes where the temperature is between minus 35 and minus 55 degrees Celsius. Institute of Atmospheric Physics at the German Aerospace Center stated that "Today's commercial jet aircraft spend around 20 percent of their flight time in the air that is so cold and humid that they form long-lasting contrails”.
When we performed a reverse image search on Google, we found that the video was first published by a YouTube channel named Der Postillon. The video is titled ‘Pilot weigerte sich, Chemtrails zu versprühen: Kündigung!’, when translated ‘Pilot reufsed to spray chemtrails: termination!’
The video has also been published on the website. Upon further research, we found that Der Postillon is a satirical website. On the website FAQ, it states that ‘Everything in the Postillon is satire and is, therefore, a blatant lie’.
When we checked other videos published on the YouTube channel of Der Postillon, we found the same person who plays the pilot, enacting other roles in other videos, which makes it clear that he is an actor.
Here is the comparison of the screenshots from the videos.
Hence, the viral video in circulation is a satirical video published by a website named Der Postillon. There has been no incident of the firing of a pilot by Lufthansa recently. The claim is False.
