A puzzling clip purported to have been taken during the ITV broadcast of Queen Elizabeth II‘s funeral has sparked massive interest on social media, but most people unsurprisingly can’t make heads or tails of it.
The oldest clip on Twitter that we could find appears to be from a social media user who pointed out what seemed to be some kind of error on the part of the broadcaster, in which a disembodied voice — in a hushed tone — seems to say “The death is irreversible…” The voice then says something else that some have interpreted as sounding like “the fact that she’s travelling…” before the audio quickly drops off.
The clip soon became a subject of conspiracy theories, owing to the creepy nature of its wording, that it was spoken in a whisper, and the fact that it was quickly cut off. Some people online even began to claim that the voice in question was the late Princess Diana. We can’t endorse any of those conspiracy theories, obviously, and we’re truly not even certain if the clip in question wasn’t doctored in some way.
Upon noticing the tweet took off in popularity, the original poster made a follow-up tweet insisting it was taken directly from the ITV broadcast and was not doctored. But the social media user also shot down any speculation that it was the voice of Diana speaking. The Twitter user instead offered their own explanation: “Likely a guest in the studio not realising mics were live at the time.”
Another Twitter user put forth the theory that the voice was saying “The death is irreversible and the fact that she’s trapped…” but again, we can’t necessarily endorse that claim, either.
The clip also made its way onto Reddit — specifically, onto the r/conspiracytheories subreddit, where it was labeled “fake news,” and the comment section was locked by moderators.
While there was no official explanation as to why the moderators of the subreddit labeled the post “fake news” and locked peoples’ ability to comment, one Reddit user did provide what is in all likelihood the real explanation of the eerie whispered words, presuming they really did get uttered over broadcast by mistake.
“Feels like a producer feeding a line to a news reader [reporter], or someone practicing a written line before going live.”
Another user pointed out how mundane the narration really is, when you stop to think about it. “Death is irreversible” is simply a statement of fact, after all. And talk of her “travelling” could easily be explained by the fact that her coffin was being transported by a car from one location to another — again, a simple statement of fact.
In all likelihood, this may have simply been a case of a reporter whispering their proposed lines — albeit poorly chosen ones that were likely altered in the finished piece — before committing them to a proper voice-over session or live broadcast, not realizing they were already in the orbit of a hot mic during their ill-fated rehearsal. Such is the nature of live broadcast news; some mistakes will slip through the cracks now and again. Either that, or the footage was doctored entirely. We will keep you up-to-date if ITV bothers to respond to the matter, as several people on Twitter have tagged them while sharing the clip.
