Social media was flooded Monday with claims that King Charles III has died, with some folks pointing to a video of a flag at Buckingham Palace being flown at half-mast. Others handed round an official announcement made to seem like the king handed away on Sunday. However they’re all pretend. The king is alive, so far as we will inform.Do We Need to Ship People to Mars for Exploration?“Flag is half mast in Buckingham palace. Information circulating both King Charles or Kate Middleton is not any extra,” one widespread tweet from a blue checkmark account reads.However as numerous different X customers identified on Monday, the favored video that’s circulating of a flag at half-mast is from late 2022, when Queen Elizabeth II died. Some customers on social media have even posted screenshots from livestreams displaying the flag at Buckingham Palace isn’t at half-mast.One other standard piece of “proof” that the 75-year-old Charles is perhaps useless is a closely pixelated announcement showing to return from Buckingham Palace, dated March 18, 2024. The pretend announcement merely reads, “The King handed away unexpectedly yesterday afternoon.”The clearly pretend letter has reportedly been making the rounds on Russian-speaking Telegram channels, in addition to X, however because the Guardian’s correspondent in Moscow put it, the announcement “seems to be prefer it was put collectively in OpenOffice.”There have additionally been false claims that the colour of the BBC’s emblem had been switched to black from purple as some sort of cryptic signal Charles had died.“BBC UK has modified its emblem from purple to black on instagram. All different BBC location logos are purple. Wtf?” one viral tweet reads.And whereas the UK’s Unbiased media outlet acknowledges shade adjustments can occur after the dying of a monarch, there are variations of the BBC emblem on-line which might be merely black and at all times have been.There’s been a flurry of curiosity within the British monarchy in latest weeks, not simply because Charles was recognized with most cancers at the start of February. Kate Middleton, the Princess of Wales, hasn’t been seen in public recently and had surgical procedure for an stomach situation, which sparked conspiracy theories about her well being. Buckingham Palace tried to quell the rumors by releasing what it offered as a latest photograph of Middleton, however that solely made issues worse after eagle-eyed web customers noticed clear indicators of digital manipulation.If Charles did die quickly, it could be one of many shortest reigns of any British monarch, whereas his mom’s reign was one of many longest. Charles has been king for one yr, six months, and 10 days. Solely two monarchs have lasted shorter intervals. Woman Jane Gray was beheaded for treason in 1554 after simply 9 days on the throne. And King Edward V died in 1483 after simply 78 days in energy. The third shortest, King Richard III, was on the throne for 2 years and 57 days, and Charles might very effectively surpass that if he lives lengthy sufficient.