Boris Johnson photoshopped out of Grant Shapps spaceport rocket picture

Source close to Shapps says: ‘Grant wasn’t aware anyone had edited the picture’
@Goosey30111568/Twitter/​PA Wire
WEST END FINAL

Get our award-winning daily news email featuring exclusive stories, opinion and expert analysis

I would like to be emailed about offers, event and updates from Evening Standard. Read our privacy notice.

Downing Street faced awkward questions on Tuesday after former Prime Minister Boris Johnson was erased from a picture posted on Business Secretary Grant Shapps’ Twitter account to mark the UK spaceport satellite launch.

Ahead of the failed launch, a picture showing the Business Secretary on a ministerial visit to the space complex in Cornwall, alongside two officials, appeared on his Twitter account.

His tweet has since been deleted.

The BBC reported that the picture posted by Mr Shapps was an edited version of an older picture published last summer, which showed Mr Johnson also at the meeting.

A source close to Mr Shapps said: “Grant wasn’t aware anyone had edited the picture.

“He removed it as soon as it was pointed out. Obviously he wouldn’t endorse anyone rewriting history by removing the former PM from a picture.”

The “original” photograph was tweeted by Virgin Orbit - the firm behind Monday night’s unsuccessful attempt to launch the first rocket into orbit from UK soil - on June 29, 2022.

It featured then-Transport Secretary Mr Shapps alongside then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson, wearing a Virgin Orbit bomber jacket emblazoned with the words ‘Prime Minister’, standing beside Mr Shapps.

Retweeting both versions of the photograph on Tuesday morning, Labour MP Louise Haigh said: “This is CLASSIC @grantshapps. I’m obsessed.”

Others said the gaffe was “made extra special by the fact that the launch completely failed”.

Another Twitter user pointed out that “part of Johnson’s elbow” appeared to have been left behind in the second image.

But others were hesitant to believe Mr Johnson had been removed.

“How are we to be sure Boris wasn’t just photoshopped INTO the photo and we now see the original?” asked one user.

Another said: “To me it looks like Boris was added. And it looks like the normal pic without Boris has been smudged. It’s the internet at its sensational best.”

On Monday night, a modified 747 jumbo jet attempted to launch a rocket over the Atlantic to take nine satellites high above the Earth, as part of The Virgin Orbit: Start Me Up mission.

But the attempt ultimately ended in failure after an “anomaly” suffered during the flight.

After taking off from Cornwall, the Virgin Orbit plane flew to 35,000ft over the Atlantic Ocean where it jettisoned the rocket containing nine small satellites towards space.

But organisers of the Start Me Up mission said the rocket - with a variety of civil and defence applications - failed to orbit.

In a series of tweets, Virgin Orbit said: “We appear to have an anomaly that has prevented us from reaching orbit. We are evaluating the information.”

The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy has been approached for a comment.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in