Turkish News Site Reports Destruction Of Washington, D.C. In Disturbingly Straightforward April Fools’ Story

Turkish news website The National Turk may have just won the award for least funny April Fools’ prank of the day. The organization posted an article with the headline “Washington DC Earthquake: 8.7 Magnitude hits US Capital fire in White House” on its English-language site Monday afternoon, complete with a photo-shopped picture of the White House in flames. Only when readers scroll to the bottom of the article do they see the disclaimer, “This is a April Fool thank you for your understanding!”

The article and photo were somewhat reminiscent of the video put out earlier this year by North Korea, which showed the destruction of New York City from a missile attack. At least in the case of the Turkish story, it was clearly meant as a joke.

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