THIS is the terrifying moment hundreds of spiders appear to “rain down” from the sky.
Hundreds of eight-legged crawlers seemingly fell from the sky in a bizarre phenomenon which was caught in rare footage.
The crawlers rained down in a horrific scene[/caption]
Online users were confused before scientists explained the phenomenon[/caption]
The incident was captured in Sao Thome das Letras, Brazil[/caption]
The nightmare scene took place in Sao Thome das Letras, in the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais.
Hair-raising video footage – which seems as if it was taken straight from a horror film – was uploaded to social media on 28 December – haunting and baffling viewers.
One user said: “Spider heaven!”
Another user, who appeared to have witnessed the horrific occurrence before, said: “It was in my brother’s backyard in Tiradentes. Always in the late afternoon. I was scared when I first saw it.”
The incident was later picked up by local media on 24 January, catching the attention of biology boffins who tried to explain what happened.
One expert and biologist, Kayron Passos, untangled the situation for local media, giving his explanation for the countless arachnids floating in the air.
He said: “It’s a spider orgy, the females have something called spermatheca, where they store the semen of different males to fertilise the eggs.”
“This way, the female ensures that she will have several different offspring and increase genetic variability,” the scientist added.
Passos also explained that even after fertilising the eggs, female spiders continue to collect semen for later use.
He said: “This behaviour increases resistance, making these offspring more resistant to diseases.”
Experts have concluded that the spiders were having a spider mating orgy – performing the ritual whilst stuck together on a very large web.
Arachnologist Ana Lucia Tourinho, who has a PhD in Biological Sciences and works at the National Institute of Amazonian Research, also shared her opinion.
“Spiders generally do not stay together, but some species exhibit this social behaviour of forming colonies.
“The strategy of staying together in a group increases the food supply for the offspring and juveniles.”
The researcher, who has been studying spiders for more than 27 years, added: “The colony usually forms every year, most of them in the colony are relatives, they are usually generations of mothers and daughters together, but after they mate they will disperse.”
In 2019, residents in the same state of Minas Girais reported seeing the same scary phenomenon of “raining spiders”.
Photos and videos posted to social media showed the haunting ritual in which hundreds of the creepy crawlers dangled in the air.
João Pedro Martinelli Fonseca, who filmed the affair, told a local newspaper that he was “stunned and scared”.
Experts told how this unnerving behaviour was more common during hot and humid weather in the region.
In 2013, another similar incident made international headlines when residents in Santo Antônio da Platina in southern Brazil witnessed the same raining spiders around telephone poles.
