‘Nothing unusual till you turn your headlights off’: Man opens truck door. Then he sees a barrel. Um… Why is the liquid inside glowing?

Moving trucks and freight loads ferry around all sorts of odds and ends. Stray items, unlabeled boxes, and, every now and then, vats of mystery substances.

One driver's discovery of such a surprise has people online trying to figure out what he actually found.

‘Nothing unusual until you turn your headlights off'

Content creator Caleb Gilbert (@caleb.gilbert34) shared footage of something strange he encountered at work. His video has since accumulated more than 1.4 million views.

Gilbert began his video by filming the inside of his moving truck from his forklift. The truck was mostly empty, except for some boxes and a singular white barrel. At first, nothing looked out of the ordinary.

“Nothing unusual until you turn your headlights off,” Gilbert said, and proceeded to do exactly that. As darkness suddenly fell, the barrel lit up brightly. It shone, almost translucent, as glowing liquid sloshed around inside from the vibrations of the forklift.

Gilbert wrote in his caption, “Nothing to see here,” but viewers had their own wisecracks to offer in his comment section.

“That's a barrel of nope,” one wrote. Another commented, “Barrel of McDonald sprite,” while a third joked, “That's the main ingredient in MTN Dew.”

One viewer found a silver lining, writing, “You have an opportunity to become a superhero and get powers.” Other commenters seemed more skeptical, with some theorizing that the glow could be a flashlight trick—or even AI-generated.

@caleb.gilbert34 Nothing to see here #shipping #forklift #fyp ♬ original sound – Caleb Gilbert

What could the glowing liquid possibly be?

It is entirely possible that Gilbert's glowing barrel was the effect of lighting, video editing, or AI. There is no verified confirmation as to the nature of the supposed liquid. However, glowing liquids aren't necessarily dangerous, or inherently exotic, on their own.

The liquid in Gilbert's video glowed bright once the lights went out. If real, this indicates phosphorescent, or “glow-in-the-dark,” material rather than a simple fluorescent dye, since phosphorescent pigments work by absorbing ambient light and then slowly releasing it in darkness.

According to glow pigment manufacturer GLO Effex, these crystalline pigments “absorb any ambient light, including regular indoor light.” They can be mixed into liquid mediums, paints, and coatings, with some formulations glowing for over 12 hours per charge. There is no way to verify that this kind of pigment makes up the contents of Gilbert's barrel. 

However, there is standardized, general safety guidance for handling unidentified containers. OSHA regulation 1910.120(j) states that “unlabeled drums and containers shall be considered to contain hazardous substances and handled accordingly until the contents are positively identified and labeled.” OSHA also advises to inspect and assure a container's “integrity” before moving it.

Buzz News has reached out to Gilbert via TikTok comment.