As deadly floods hit swathes of China, an old photo resurfaced in social media posts that falsely claimed it showed a heroic policeman who collapsed after rescuing more than 50 people. The man pictured is in fact a police officer who reportedly fainted with fatigue and heatstroke during a search for a missing hiker in 2020.
“After rescuing 51 people in a row, Yang Xuheng was swept away by huge waves and was missing for more than 10 hours,” read a simplified Chinese Weibo post that shared the photo on July 11.
Yang went on to rescue six more people trapped in the floods, and survived thanks this “excellent physical fitness” and “strong survival instinct”, the post said.
“He is a police officer of the people, the people’s hero,” it added.
The photo, shared by an account with more than four million followers, shows a man in police uniform collapsed on the ground.
The picture made the rounds on Chinese video platform Douyin as well as on YouTube after flash floods in northern and southwest China killed at least 20 people and left dozens missing, state media reported.
China is enduring a summer of extreme weather, with heavy rains across the east and south coming as much of the north has sweltered under successive heatwaves.
Many social media users appeared to believe the photo showed a police officer involved in the flood rescue efforts.
“Bravo! You’re the one that touched everyone’s heart in China this year,” one comment read.
“The best news I heard this year,” another said.
Hiker rescue
However, the photo was taken during an operation to rescue a lost hiker four years previously.
A reverse image search found the picture in a report from August 6, 2020 by Chinese state-owned television channel Hunan TV Economic (archived link).
The photo caption identified the man pictured as Huang Huimin and said he fainted from fatigue and heatstroke during a search for a missing 73-year-old hiker.
Several officers suffered from exhaustion and injuries during the four-day rescue operation in the mountains in Hunan province, the report said.
Below is a screengrab of the photo shared in false posts (left) and in the Hunan TV’s report (right):
Meanwhile, the heroic police officer described in social media posts is a different man who reportedly rescued 51 people in flooding China’s Henan province in 2021.
Yang Xuheng went missing for 10 hours after he was swept away in heavy rains on July 20, 2021, Chinese state media The Paper reported (archived link).
The Paper published a photo of Yang (left) at the scene of the rescue operation.
Catastrophic flooding in Henan province that summer killed 398 people and caused economic losses of more than $10 billion.
