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A rain of animals is a rare
meteorological phenomenon in which flightless animals fall from the sky. Such occurrences have been reported in many countries throughout history.
One hypothesis is that
tornadic waterspouts sometimes pick up creatures such as fish or frogs, and carry them for up to several miles.
However, this aspect of the phenomenon has never been witnessed by scientists.
[When It Rains Animals: The Science of True Weather Weirdness](_blank)
Alasdair Wilkins. March 21, 2012.
History
Rain of flightless animals and things has been reported throughout history.
In the first century AD, Roman naturalist
Pliny the Elder
Gaius Plinius Secundus (AD 23/2479), called Pliny the Elder (), was a Roman author, naturalist and natural philosopher, and naval and army commander of the early Roman Empire, and a friend of the emperor Vespasian. He wrote the encyclopedic ' ...
documented storms of frogs and fish. In 1794, French soldiers saw toads fall from the sky during heavy rain at Lalain, near the French city of
Lille
Lille ( , ; nl, Rijsel ; pcd, Lile; vls, Rysel) is a city in the northern part of France, in French Flanders. On the river Deûle, near France's border with Belgium, it is the capital of the Hauts-de-France region, the prefecture of the N ...
.
Rural inhabitants in
Yoro
Yoro, with a population of 25,560 (2020 calculation), is the capital city of the Yoro Department of Honduras and the municipal seat of Yoro Municipality. It is notable for a local event known as Lluvia de Peces, where it is claimed that strong ...
, Honduras claim 'fish rain' happens there every summer, a phenomenon they call
Lluvia de Peces.
Explanations
French physicist
André-Marie Ampère (1775–1836) was among the first scientists to take seriously accounts of raining animals. Addressing the Society of Natural Science, Ampère suggested that at times frogs and toads roam the countryside in large numbers, and that violent winds could pick them up and carry them great distances.
After a reported rain of fish in Singapore in 1861, French naturalist
Francis de Laporte de Castelnau
Francis may refer to:
People
*Pope Francis, the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State and Bishop of Rome
* Francis (given name), including a list of people and fictional characters
*Francis (surname)
Places
* Rural ...
speculated that a migration of
walking catfish
The walking catfish (''Clarias batrachus'') is a species of freshwater airbreathing catfish native to Southeast Asia. It is named for its ability to "walk" and wiggle across dry land, to find food or suitable environments. While it does not tru ...
had taken place, dragging themselves over land from one puddle to another, following the rain.
The likeliest explanation for many of the supposed cases is that there is no falling happening at all and the animals are driven along by winds or a deluge of some sort.
This explanation also accounts for the prevalence of reports that only a single species or type of animal is ever reported raining from the sky.
A current scientific hypothesis involves
tornadic waterspouts: a
tornado
A tornado is a violently rotating column of air that is in contact with both the surface of the Earth and a cumulonimbus cloud or, in rare cases, the base of a cumulus cloud. It is often referred to as a twister, whirlwind or cyclone, altho ...
that forms over the water.
Under this hypothesis, a tornadic waterspout transports animals to relatively high altitudes, carrying them over large distances. This hypothesis appears supported by the type of animals in these rains: small and light, usually aquatic, and by the suggestion that the rain of animals is often preceded by a storm. However, the theory does not account for how all the animals involved in each individual incident would be from only one
species
In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate s ...
, and not a group of similarly sized animals from a single area. Further, the theory also does not account for a genuine tornadic waterspout not actually sucking objects up and carrying them rather than flinging objects out to the sides.
In the case of birds, storms may overcome a flock in flight, especially in times of migration. The Doppler image to the right shows an example wherein a group of bats is overtaken by a thunderstorm. In the image, the bats are in the red zone, which corresponds to winds moving away from the radar station, and enter into a
mesocyclone
A mesocyclone is a meso-gamma mesoscale (or storm scale) region of rotation (vortex), typically around in diameter, most often noticed on radar within thunderstorms. In the northern hemisphere it is usually located in the right rear flank (back ...
associated with a tornado (in green). These events may occur easily with birds, which can get killed in flight, or stunned and then fall (unlike flightless creatures, which first have to be lifted into the air by an outside force). Sometimes this happens in large groups, for instance, the
blackbirds falling from the sky in
Beebe, Arkansas
Beebe is a city in White County, Arkansas, United States. The population was 7,315 at the 2010 U.S. Census, making it the second most populous in the county. The city is home to Arkansas State University-Beebe. ASU-Beebe also has branch campuse ...
,
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...
on December 31, 2010. It is common for birds to become disoriented (for example, because of bad weather or fireworks) and collide with objects such as trees or buildings, killing them or stunning them into falling to their death. The number of blackbirds killed in Beebe is not spectacular considering the size of their congregations, which can be in the millions. The event in Beebe, however, captured the imagination and led to more reports in the media of birds falling from the sky across the globe, such as in
Sweden and
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...
, though many scientists claim such mass deaths are common occurrences but usually go unnoticed. In contrast, it is harder to find a plausible explanation for rains of terrestrial animals.
Some cases are thought to be caused by birds dropping fish. With regard to a documented rain of fish that occurred on December 29, 2021 in
Texarkana, Texas
Texarkana is a city in Bowie County, Texas, United States, in the Ark-La-Tex region. Located approximately from Dallas, Texarkana is a twin city with neighboring Texarkana, Arkansas. The Texas city's population was 36,193 at the 2020 census.
...
, independent researchers
Sharon A. Hill and Paul Cropper proposed that the fish had been dropped or possibly regurgitated by passing birds. The theory found some favor with airport workers who had cleaned up the fish; they noted that there were birds in the area around the same time, and the fish "were kind of chewed up." In June 2022 around the
San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...
coast, a boom of anchovies is likely to be the cause of fair weather falling of fish from birds' mouths, such as pelicans.
Examples in popular culture
* ''
Magnolia
''Magnolia'' is a large genus of about 210 to 340The number of species in the genus ''Magnolia'' depends on the taxonomic view that one takes up. Recent molecular and morphological research shows that former genera ''Talauma'', ''Dugandiodendro ...
''
* ''
Sharknado (film series)
''Sharknado'' is a series of six American made-for-television science fiction action comedy horror disaster films released by Syfy between 2013 and 2018. It has since been expanded into video games and comics, including a spin-off film, ''Shar ...
''
* ''
Watchmen (TV series)
''Watchmen'' is an American superhero drama limited series based on the 1986 DC Comics series of the same title created by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons. The TV series was created for HBO by Damon Lindelof, who also served as an executive produ ...
''
* ''
Fuego gris'' (also here: at the
article's Spanish version).
* ''
JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure Part 6: Stone Ocean (manga/anime series)''
*
Fargo (TV series)
See also
*
Blood rain Blood rain is a phenomenon where blood is perceived to fall from the sky in the form of rain.
Blood Rain may also refer to:
* ''Blood Rain'' (film), a 2005 thriller film
* ''Blood Rain'' (novel), a 1999 crime novel
See also
*''BloodRayne'', a ...
*
Flying fish
The Exocoetidae are a family of marine fish in the order Beloniformes class Actinopterygii, known colloquially as flying fish or flying cod. About 64 species are grouped in seven to nine genera. While they cannot fly in the same way a bird d ...
*
Lluvia de Peces, (Honduras, "Fish rain")
*
Red rain in Kerala
The Kerala red rain phenomenon was a blood rain event that occurred in Wayanad district region of Malabar on Monday, 15 July 1957 and the colour subsequently turned yellow and also 25 July to 23 September 2001, when heavy downpours of red-col ...
*
Star jelly
*
Raining cats and dogs
*
Kentucky meat shower
References
Further reading
* Bajkov, A.D. Do fish fall from the sky? Science, v. 109, April 22, 1949: 402.
* Bourchier, Daniel. “It’s raining fish…no really.” Sunday Territorian, Australia, February 28, 2010.
* Branley, Franklyn M. It's raining cats and dogs: all kinds of weather and why we have it. Illustrated by True Kelley. Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1987. 112 p. (Juvenile)
* Cerveny, Randall S. Freaks of the storm: from flying cows to stealing thunder, the world's strangest true weather stories. New York, Thunder's Mouth Press, c2006. 371 p.
* Chandler, Barb. Froggy weather. Weather-wise, v. 57, Jan./Feb. 2004: 42.
* Christian, Spencer and Antonia Felix. Can it really rain frogs?: the world's strangest weather events. New York, Wiley, 1997. 121 p. (Juvenile).
* Corliss, William. Tornados, dark days, anomalous precipitation, and related weather phenomena: a catalog of geophysical anomalies. Glen Arm, MD:
Sourcebook Project, c1983. 196 p.
* Dennis, Jerry. It's raining frogs and fishes: four seasons of natural phenomena and oddities of the sky. New York, HarperCollins, c1992. 323 p.
* Englebert, Phillis. The complete weather resource. Detroit, UXL, c1997–2000. 4 v.
* “Frogs fall from the sky.” Herald Sun, Melbourne, Australia, June 8, 2005. p. 2.
* Gray, J. E. The shower of fishes. Zoologist; a monthly journal of natural history, v. 17, 1859: 6540–6541
* Gudger, E. W. Do fish fall from the sky with rain? Scientific Monthly, v. 29, December 1929: 523–527.
* McAtee, Waldo L. Showers of organic matter
Monthly Weather Review, v. 45, May 1917: 217–224
* Posey, Carl A. The living earth book of wind and weather. Pleasantville, NY, Reader's Digest Association, c1994. 224 p.
* Waterspouts. In McGraw-Hill concise encyclopedia of science and technology. 5th edition. New York, McGraw-Hill, c2005. pp. 2369–2370.
External links
{{Commons category, Raining animals
A review on the American perspective.
10 Craziest Things To Fall From the SkyFafrotskies (An acronym for ''falls from the skies'')
Anomalous weather
Animals in popular culture
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