http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wz8AC5RXQXQ

China’s state-run media has been known to stretch the truth in the past, but now they’re making a claim that really beggars belief: they have footage of human teleportation. Is it from the basement labs of some high-tech, secret government research center? No, it’s from a traffic surveillance camera, but could it be the real deal?

The clip shows an intersection at night. From the rear of the screen, a truck approaches. Then, from the left of the screen, a bicycle enters the roadway. There’s no way for the truck to avoid the biker, but the driver slams on the brakes. And at that precise moment, something very strange happens.

A figure dashes in from the right and the biker disappears just as he would have been hit by the truck!

The truck is comes to a stop, and the driver clambers out of the cab, looking underneath the truck for a body, but finds nothing. Although he wasn’t going very fast, was the biker perhaps flung off-screen?

No, the driver looks confusedly around the intersection, but can’t locate the biker. The bike itself is now miraculously at the back of the screen, next to two people who weren’t there before. (Insert creepy music here.)

According to the program that aired the clip, teleportation is just one explanation for the footage, but it wasn’t able to confirm what actually happened. Of course, there’s no shortage of people who pointed out the jerky image suggests an altogether more mundane explanation: it’s a fake.

But where’s the fun in that?

Via Byoukan Sunday