Map illustration showing the location of Calabar. Photo source: PaintMaps
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Claim: A user in Calabar, Cross River State, Nigeria, reports that snow has started falling.
Verdict: False. There is no evidence from credible meteorological sources or news outlets indicating snowfall in Calabar. Nigeria’s tropical climate makes natural snowfall virtually impossible.
Full Text
Climate change is a global phenomenon that refers to long-term shifts in the Earth’s temperature and weather patterns.
According to the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services, climate change is contributing to the intensification of extreme weather events, such as heatwaves, cold spells, storms, floods, and droughts, across various regions of the world.
Amid global climate concerns, viral claims of snowfall in Nigeria, a West African country in the tropical climate zone, have continued to circulate on social media.
The rapid evolution of artificial intelligence has added a new dimension to the spread of such claims.
The growing availability of free and largely unregulated generative AI tools has made it easy to create and disseminate false information at scale, including images that imitate real people and events, making it difficult to distinguish them from authentic content.
In this context, a user, @RealTony, posted images on social media on December 1, 2025, claiming that snow had started falling in Calabar. The photos show what appears to be snow on the ground.
The post’s caption read, “Snow has started falling in Calabar!”
As of Dec. 17, 2025, the post had generated 256,400 views, 2,400 likes, 220 comments, 190 reposts, and 177 bookmarks.
Some users, like @ogbeDoraAtuora, agreed with the comment, “The snow is too much, I couldn’t come out yesterday.”
While others, like @ireayooo, dismissed the claim, cautioning the user to “stop lying.”
The nature of the claim and the engagement it attracted made DUBAWA conduct an investigation.
Verification
DUBAWA first conducted a keyword search to determine whether snow had actually fallen in Calabar recently, reasoning that credible media outlets would have reported such an unusual event.
The search returned no results because no reputable news outlets reported snowfall in the city.
We reviewed meteorological data on recent weather conditions in Calabar, which also showed no evidence of snow.
Reports from the Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NiMet) confirm that no snowfall has been recorded in Calabar or anywhere else in Nigeria.
Additionally, according to the World Population Review’s 2025 report on tropical countries, Nigeria is classified as a fully tropical nation.
Tropical regions typically experience hot, humid weather, with average temperatures rarely dropping below 20 °C. This condition makes snowfall impossible.
We also conducted a review of climate records for Calabar, located in southern Nigeria. The record shows that the city has a tropical rainforest climate, with average temperatures ranging from 24°C to 32°C year-round.
Since snow formation requires temperatures at or below 0 °C, it is physically impossible for snowfall to occur under Calabar’s climatic conditions.
Secondly, we noticed uniform snow accumulation on roads, rooftops, and trees, suggesting prolonged winter conditions rather than a sudden weather event.
Finally, to verify the authenticity of the images, we analysed them using Forensically, an image analysis tool designed to detect manipulation and reveal hidden details.
The software indicated that all the pictures had been edited and contained evidence of digital manipulation, including cloning.
Specifically, the clone detection feature revealed that snow had been artificially copied and pasted across different parts of each image, confirming that the pictures were manipulated.
Conclusion
The claim that snow fell in Calabar is false. There is no credible evidence from meteorological sources or news outlets to support the claim that snow fell in Calabar.
Nigeria’s tropical climate makes natural snowfall impossible, and the images circulating online have been digitally manipulated.
