No, flags at Buckingham Palace were not recently flown at half-mast

In January of this year, Kensington Palace, home of the prince and princess of Wales, announced that Kate, the Princess of Wales, underwent abdominal surgery and would not be making public appearances until after Easter. In February, King Charles III was diagnosed with cancer and began seeking treatment, a statement from Buckingham Palace said.

After an edited photo of Kate Middleton and her children was released by Kensington Palace on March 10, social media users wondered if something suspicious was happening behind palace walls. 

On March 17, nearly a week after an apparent X post from Kate Middleton confirmed the photo was edited, reports of an impending announcement from Buckingham Palace trended on X. That same day, images and videos claiming to show flags atop Buckingham Palace at half-mast were posted on X. 

One X post published March 17 with a nighttime view of Britain’s national flag, known as the Union Jack flag, reads, “BREAKING: Reports that the Union Flag is flying at half-mast at some Government Buildings across the United Kingdom tonight amid reports the BBC is on standby for an ‘imminent announcement’ from the Royal Family.”

The trend continued on March 18, with similar posts with images that appear to show the flag at half-mast at Buckingham Palace. 

People online wondered if the flags were really being flown at half-mast at Buckingham Palace.

THE QUESTION

Were flags recently flown at half-mast at Buckingham Palace?

THE SOURCES

• Videos posted to social media on March 17 and March 18, filmed at Buckingham Palace
• The Evening Standard, a London-based daily newspaper
• The Flag Institute, a U.K.-based organization that researches flags
• The Royal Family on X
• RevEye, a reverse image search tool
• Original photos published in 2022

THE ANSWER

No, flags at Buckingham Palace were not recently flown at half-mast.

WHAT WE FOUND

There is no evidence that the flags were flown at half-mast at Buckingham Palace on March 17, when the claims started going viral. Live videos taken from Buckingham Palace on March 17 and March 18 confirm the flags were being flown at full-staff. Further, images recently used that show the flags at half-staff were actually images or videos taken in 2022 when Queen Elizabeth died.

On Snap Map, which is a Snapchat feature that allows you to view recent stories by location, a video posted on Sunday, March 17, shows Buckingham Palace and Union Jack at the top of the flagpole – not at half-mast.

Three Facebook live videos streamed from Buckingham Palace on March 18 also clearly show Union Jack flying at full-mast atop the palace roof. 

Some of the posts shared on social media that shared the false claim included images of the palace with the flag at half-mast. This post includes a photo taken during the day of a flag at half-mast. We used RevEye, a reverse image search tool, and found the same photo posted online by an Al Jazeera correspondent in September 2022 when Queen Elizabeth died. 

The video with that same post also appears to be from 2022. 

This post that includes a photo showing a nighttime view of Britain’s national flag is also from 2022 and actually wasn’t even taken in the United Kingdom. A reverse image search led us to a Turkish news agency’s website that published the same image showing a flag on top of a British consulate building in Istanbul. 

The Evening Standard, a London-based daily newspaper, also reported the flags were not being flown at half-mast.

Union Jack is traditionally flown at half-mast in the United Kingdom to honor several occasions, including the death of a member of the royal family. There has been no recent official announcement of any death of any member of the royal family. While there are a number of other occasions that could call for the flag to be flown at half-mast, like if the funeral of a prime minister or foreign ruler, those occasions weren’t happening in the United Kingdom when these claims went viral, either.