A 50-year-old man from Chongqing has been detained for posting an edited image of a “giant dragon” which he claimed was responsible for a deadly earthquake that hit Sichuan province on June 17.
The man, surnamed Zhang, posted the photo of the huge “dragon” lying on a rural hillside along with the caption:
“A 120-meter giant dragon with a diameter of 1.5 meters jumped out of the water at 2 pm this afternoon, attracting thousands of people. Chengdu Municipal Committee is highly concerned about this… Experts have been sent to the area and it is said that the dragon is related to the earthquake.”
The post followed a 6.0 magnitude quake which struck near the city of Yibin, killing 13 people.
While the image may have been clearly fake, it received quite a few shares, resulting in Yibin police launching an investigation into the source of the rumor, accusing Zhang of causing a “social panic.”
After being detained, Zhang apologized for creating the image, explaining that he had only meant it as a joke.
