Early this morning, a Redditor asked why the world wasn't talking about the disaster in Times Square last New Year's Eve when a firework supposedly destroyed the famous New Year's Eve ball and caused its annual descent to be delayed.
The reason "the world" isn't chatting about this incident is because it didn't happen, despite a fairly convincing viral video on TikTok attempting to show that it did.
@immadsal Yikes wheres a good place to count down?? #nye #timessquarenyc #balldrop ♬ original sound – Madeline Salazar
The video was created by user @immadsal, a creator who has made several popular videos demonstrating the use of AI to create convincing images.
With some AI-generated images of the famous broken Times Square ball, footage of cops at the scene and a "testimonial" saying the ball was broken as late as 11:50 p.m., some users were convinced that the ball actually had been destroyed by a firework.
Another user suggested that the "ball drop" users saw on TV was footage from a previous year. While some said the "countdown" was behind and that it was actually midnight before ABC's official countdown began.
There have been no reports of the ball getting destroyed by fireworks or the countdown being late by reputable news outlets. The ball was obviously not destroyed, as verified by multiple other angles and photographs of the ball's descent into 2024.
@mickmicknyc Replying to @Shopper here is the NYE ball up close snd personal 🥳💞🥂 Happy New Year!! @Times Square NYC #confettiwish #timessquare #2024 #timessquarenyc #nyc #fyp #confetti #nye #nyeball #nyeballdrop #balldrop #timesquareball ♬ original sound – New York Mickey
As for whether it started late, some users say they saw their phones reading 12:01 as the ball descended, but no media outlets have reported this to be accurate.