PolitiFact – No, this video doesn’t show a missile hitting the Pentagon on 9/11

More than two decades after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, conspiracy theorists are claiming there is new footage of that day’s attack on the Pentagon.

An Instagram reel, shared Sept. 12, shows a grainy video under bold text that reads, “9/11’s HIDDEN FOOTAGE MISSILE HITTING PENTAGON.”

The low-quality video replays a short clip of a blurry white object moving toward the Pentagon, but the clip loops to the beginning before any explosion.

The post’s caption said, “newly released footage of a camera overlooking the Pentagon appears to show none other than a SCUD Missile hitting the Pentagon.” (Scud missiles are tactical ballistic missiles developed by the Soviet Union during the Cold War.)

The post was flagged as part of Meta’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram.)

There is overwhelming evidence that a hijacked airplane struck the Pentagon on 9/11, not a missile.

The 9/11 Commission report explains in detail what happened the day of the attacks. After American Airlines Flight 77 was hijacked and redirected toward the Pentagon, around 9:38 a.m. that day, it crashed into the building at 530 miles per hour, killing all 64 people onboard and 125 people in the Pentagon.

Pentagon security footage shows a white object, the plane, flying into the building before exploding upon impact. This footage was released in 2006 as a result of a public records request filed by the conservative group Judicial Watch.

FBI photos of the attack’s aftermath also show debris from the airplane. Images from the Navy Archives similarly show pieces of the plane on the ground outside the Pentagon.

The Pentagon has memorialized those killed at the site. The flight victims included sisters Zoe and Dana Falkenberg, ages 3 and 8, of Maryland, who were on a trip with their parents to Australia; American Airlines employee Mary Jane Booth, 64, of Virginia, who was flying to Las Vegas for a meeting of the employees’ credit union; and U.S. Navy Capt. John D. Yamnicky, 71, of Maryland, who was headed to California to work on a missile program.

We rate the claim that a video shows a missile hitting the Pentagon on 9/11 Pants on Fire!