Conspiracy theorists claim snow in Texas is 'fake' as it 'doesn't melt' in viral video

Conspiracy theorists have been flooding social media with videos claiming the winter storm in Texas is "fake" as the snow "doesn't melt".

Many parts of the US have had had to contend with the winter storm, which started last week. Texas, of which Republican Greg Abbot is governor, appears to have fared the worst of Winter Storm Uri.

In fact, as reported by NBC News, as many as 10 million Texas residents woke up without safe drinking water on Monday (February 22), as a result of the winter storm.

Credit: PA Images

Texas officials are now even planning to rapidly increase the distribution of bottled water to help struggling residents. As per the outlet, up to 3.5 million bottles of water had been distributed via helicopter, airplane, and truck across Texas. The storm has also led to a huge spike in electricity bills for Texans.

But despite the deaths of 58 people due to the conditions, some people are claiming that it's all a government conspiracy. Their proof? The snow supposedly "doesn't melt".

One woman posted a video – that appears to have since been deleted – in which she holds a cigarette lighter to what appears to be a snowball in her bathroom sink, claiming that it doesn't melt at all.

"This goes out to our government and Bill Gates. Thank you Bill Gates for trying to f***ing trick us that this is real snow," she says, according to the Independent.

"You’ll see it’s not melting and it’s going to burn. Snow don’t burn. Snow f***ing melts. No water, no dripping, no nothing. If I put this s*** in the microwave, it’s going to start sparking because there’s metal mixed in it."

In another video, someone produces a snowball from her lawn and holds it over a tealight candle, and also concludes that it doesn't melt.

Back in 2014, science writer Phil Plait of Slate debunked the idea that such "experiments" were foolproof.

Plait explained: "As the snow melts, the remaining snow absorbs the water. That’s why it doesn’t appear to drip; the snowball becomes a slushball."

He said of the reaction to a similar storm in 2014: "Lots of people made videos showing the snowball not dripping so it looks like it’s not actually melting, but this is a classic case of confirmation bias.

"They only tested this part way; they didn’t finish the test by letting the snowball actually melt!"