It’s a beautiful day outside, so you decide to go take a walk. The sun is shining. The neighborhood kids are outside playing (in this scenario all their phones are inside charging). Suddenly, a spider falls onto your arm. You brush it off and continue on with your walk. Then suddenly another lands on your arm. Then another. Soon you look up to see the sky is filled with tiny spiders falling right on top of you. Are you dreaming? Have you been transported into one of Dan Slott’s Spidey tales? It’s none of those things. You’ve just encountered the phenomenon known as Spider Rain, as this video from Today I Found Out explains.
Spider Rain is actually caused in part by the act of “ballooning,” in which a spider releases a strand of webbing which is caught by the wind, and can carry the spider for, in some instances, thousands of miles. The rain-like form is created when this ballooning is done by millions of spiders at one time. For those of you who can’t stand to be within 100 yards of a spider, fear not. Spider Rain mostly occurs in specific parts of Australia. And even though it sounds like something created for a movie, it does have its positive aspects. After a large flood or fire, ballooning spiders are usually the first to return to the area, helping to rebuild the ecosystem.
If you either watched or read Charlotte’s Web when you were little, it’s pretty cool to know the ending where Charlotte’s children are whisked away was based on science, and not fantasy.
You can check out more videos from Today I Found Out on their YouTube channel here.
So what do you think? Is Spider Rain a cool phenomenon, or is it your worst nightmare come to life? Let me know on Twitter @donnielederer or sound off in the comments below.
Image: Today I Found Out
Need more friendly neighborhood spider-stories?
- Dancing peacock spiders with lightsabers.
- Spiders eat more meat than we do.
- Mecha-spiders have a race!
