Apple Store table sanding sends Twitter into coronavirus meltdown

What you need to know

• A video showing the Belfast Apple Store being "deep cleaned" is going viral on Twitter.
• We see three people working on a table.
• But really, they're just sanding it to make it look nice and new.

If you've been near Twitter today you've probably seen a video doing the rounds. It shows three people in the Belfast Apple Store, apparently carrying out a deep clean of a table. Given the current coronavirus situation, people assumed that the store was being disinfected. But that isn't actually what's going on here.

https://twitter.com/mrgaryyoung/status/1234975280797642752

We called and spoke to the store in question, and while we were told that team members cannot comment on posts to social media, we do know what's really going on. And it's nothing to do with coronavirus. It's all much more mundane than that.

As we've learned from former Apple Store employees, stores regularly have their huge wooden tables refinished to make sure they always look like new. And that, it appears, is exactly what's going on here. If you watch the video above you can see someone sanding the table.

It's also worth noting that if some sort of antiviral deep cleaning was taking place, all three people would be wearing specialist masks. Only one person in the video is. The others, not so much. We don't imagine anyone would be doing a deep clean of anything while wearing a T-shirt and shorts, either.

So there we have it. Another viral video debunked. Move along folks.

I've also reached out to Apple to ask whether they do have any plans for specialist cleaning given the coronavirus outbreak. I'll update this article when I hear back.