10 Greatest April Fools Day Hoaxes Of All Time
8. Flying Penguins (1 April 2008)
BBC released a trailer for an upcoming documentary called Miracles of Evolution that introduced the world to a new discovery: penguins that could fly. The trailer was presented by Terry Jones (from Monty Python) under the name Prof. Alid Loyas.
The trailer starts with Terry Jones standing in a frozen landscape. Penguins are milling around.
“They don’t need to huddle together every winter for protection against the bitter cold, because these little fellas can do something that no other penguins can.” Cut to footage of penguins running along the ice and flapping their wings and then, amazingly, they take off into the skies.
“Isn’t that amazing?” Terry continues, “And how do they use this incredible ability? Well, they fly thousands of miles to the rainforests of South America where they spend the winter basking in the tropical sun.”
The film is brilliantly convincing. It was reported in many of the big newspapers in the UK. The news editor of The Guardian suspected something might be up when he realised “Prof Alid Loyas” was an anagram of “April Fools’ Day”.