Does this video show a tsunami in Japan? No, that's not true: The video is from a flash flood in northern Turkey and it's from August 2021.
The claim originated from a video (archived here) published on TikTok by @leejaeyeol50 on January 8, 2024, just days after a powerful earthquake hit Japan, on January 1, 2024 (archived here). The caption in Korean in the video reads, as translated by Lead Stories staff:
#Japan #tsunami #earthquake #getridofallofthem
This is what the post looked like on TikTok at the time of writing:
(Source: TikTok screenshot taken on Mon Jan 15 16:08:05 2024 UTC)
The screenshot shows that the original video (archived here) is from @anature.us and was initially posted on November 7, 2023.
This is what the post looked like on TikTok at the time of writing:
(Source: TikTok screenshot taken on Mon Jan 15 16:09:41 2024 UTC)
However, the original video did not provide any specific details about where the natural disaster took place. Through a reverse Google image search of an article (archived here) Lead Stories staff found a clip from August 11, 2021, in The Guardian. The article's thumbnail image was an aerial landscape view of the northern coast of Turkey, with buildings and cars trapped in water.
The New York Times (archived here) also reported that five children were missing due to the flash flood.
