A tube sign expressing solidarity between London and Manchester is not a real sign

27 October 2020

What was claimed

London tube workers wrote a humorous message in solidarity with Manchester.

Our verdict

This isn’t a real London Underground tube sign.

A sign apparently seen at a London tube station has been shared across social media. The sign has been praised for expressing solidarity between London and Manchester during recent negotiations regarding financial support for Manchester’s move into a higher tier of restrictions.

However, this isn’t a real tube sign, and we can find no evidence that it ever appeared in a tube station. The iconic blue tube roundel in the top left of the sign reads “This isn’t real.”

There are some other features that offer clues that it isn’t a real tube sign—despite being shared across the internet, only one photo and angle of the sign appears. If this were at a tube station, it’s likely there would be some alternative shots of the message. Fake tube signs are also well-known memes online; we’ve written about them before.

You can learn more about spotting misleading images online here.

This article is part of our work fact checking potentially false pictures, videos and stories on Facebook. You can read more about this—and find out how to report Facebook content—here. For the purposes of that scheme, we’ve rated this claim as satire because this is not a real tube sign.

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