Videos from an outdoor mall in Miami stoked bizarre claims that aliens had touched down in Florida. Police later reacted to the rumors.
Days after bizarre claims that aliens had touched down in Florida went viral on social media, Miami police dismissed the rumors, saying “there were no aliens, UFOs, or ETs.”
On Monday night, over sixty police vehicles descended upon the Bayside Marketplace in downtown Miami.(X) Putting speculations to rest, police said: “No aliens, UFOs, or ET’s. No airports were closed. No power outages.”
The rumors began when a video surfaced on the internet that purportedly showed a huge figure walking outside Bayside Marketplace, a downtown Miami shopping center, as dozens of police cruisers with flashing lights encircled it.
However, police claim that the blurry, close-up footage, which was recorded from multiple levels above, is not at all unearthly.
“It’s a shadow of a person walking. If you look at the beginning of the clip, you can see the person at the bottom of the shadow,” Officer Michael Vega said in a statement, The New York Post reported.
“If there was any creature, myself and other officers would have our handgun, r!fle, and sh*tgun out while we hide behind our cars,” the statement added.
Heavy police presence at Miami mall raised suspicion among social media users
On Monday night, over sixty police vehicles descended upon the Bayside Marketplace in downtown Miami in order to break up a brawl between group of teenagers who were reportedly hurling fireworks at each other in the open-air shopping mall.
Local station WPLG-TV reported that four juveniles were taken into custody in relation to the inc!dent. According to the arrest reports, the teenagers were “causing panic” and “causing a riot inside the mall”.
Meanwhile, several people contacted 911 at 8:30 pm (local time) to report what they believed were g*nsh*ts, but they were actually loud fireworks. This led to the arrival of dozens of police officers at the two-story mall located at 401 Biscayne Blvd.
The heavy police deployment to address the case raised suspicions among the social media users. Those who analysed the footage of the Miami mall incident formed the theory that an alien “creature” was the true cause of the disruption.
However, police later informed that the real reason behind their massive presence at the mall was in response to reports that over 50 juveniles possibly armed with sticks were f!ghting in the mall.
‘Miami mall aliens’: Social media launched a speculation frenzy
Following the inc!dent, some said on social media that the surrounding airports were closed, while others stated they lost Wi-Fi or power. Miami Police later verified that all of these cla!ms were false.
“10ft Aliens/Creatures (caught on camera?) fired at inside and outside Miami Mall, media silent, cops are covering it up saying kids were f!ghting with f!reworks, yet all these cop cars, & air traffic stopped that night except for black military choppers…and no media coverage,” one user wrote on X.
“I zoomed in on one of the Tiktok videos about the Miami mall creature, so you can see the gray creature walking in between these police cars and the building,” wrote another user on the platform.
“I’m not sure what part of this story bugs me most: the fact that we actually live in a world where something like this can happen … or that something like this can happen in our world or that not a single new media has broke the story, not at all,” a woman said on TikTok.
