Animal Falls: Falls Or Rains Of Animals (Frogs, Fish, Etc.)

[evilsprout]

Any frog/fish falls recently?

Maybe I've been reading the wrong papers, but I've not heard of any frog or fish rains recently. Has anyone else?

 

[Anonymous]

There was one in Ethiopia about a year ago. They had a very dry period, and one day fish started raining from the sky. They must have felt like the gods were mocking them.

Anyone seen that Gary Larson strip where some indians are standing with some kitchen utensils laying on the ground. And they are looking in a book trying to find out what they did wrong in the rain dance. I do wonder if somehting like that has happened in real life, and what the outcome was then.

 

[mikelegs]

According to this website, one in 1995 reported by none-other than FT.

Also, very interesting. It's a christian site.

Gay, but offers yet another report, with a reference, nonetheless.

I'm re-hashing here, but they list references at least.

Hope this is useful.

 

[Anonymous]

Raining frogs ..

Has anyone experienced 'freak' rain in the UK?
I have seen odd reports about frogs, fish, sahara sand, giant hail etc but I am specifically interested in an event which possibly occured in the 60's in West Yorkshire
I was about 10 or 11 at the time and the entire street was covered with small frogs - I was told at the time that had it 'rained' frogs
Anyone?

 

[Anonymous]

Disappointed!
I thought *someone* would have had some info!
Maybe if I bump it back to the top ..

 

[Anonymous]

Knottingley/Ferrybridge area
I have seen (a long, looong time ago!) a newspaper clipping about frog rain, but I'm not certain it was this occasion

 

[Anonymous]

I'm sure I've seen at least one frog around here somewhere...

Can't remember anything in this country. Ribit-ing topic though!

Big Bill Robinson

 

[Anonymous]

Just found this, here

"A fall of frogs is, perhaps, the archetypal Fortean (named after Charles Fort, himself) event. The Fortean Times published a first hand account of a frog fall in its first issue, back in 1973. Mrs S. Mowday went to see a Royal Navy display on the Meadow Platt in Sutton Park, near Birmingham, on June l2th, 1954.

"I attended the display with my young son and daughter. It was a Saturday and there were frequent heavy showers...We tried to shelter from a shower under the trees...when we were bombarded by tiny frogs, which seemed to come down with the rain. There were literally thousands of them. They descended on our umbrellas, on us and we were afraid to walk for fear of treading on them." A British frog fall also occured in October 1987, when large numbers of rose coloured albino frogs fell on several occasions around Stroud, Cirencester and Cheltenham."

Does anyone have the original FT story?

 

[marianne718]

... the gold fish in the puddle reminded me of something I witnessed about 2 years ago. The culprit was a sea gull flying over a parking lot in Brooklyn, about 1/2 mile inland. The bird caught my attention because it was struggling to remain aloft with a rather large payload. The gull lost the battle and, from a height of about 3 stories, released a 12-inch live crab onto the shoulder of man walking about 10 yards ahead of me. The guy jumped and screamed and knocked the crab to the ground where it skittered away and hid under a parked car. He was visibly shaken (understandably so). He began looking around for an explanation and caught my eye, so I smiled and pointed up to the sky. He looked up, but of course, by then the gull was gone and the sky was empty. That seemed to scare him even more and he ran full tilt back to his car and drove away.

It was only later that I realized he must have thought I was some sort of prophet of retribution with the power to make live crabs drop from the sky.

 

[rynner2]

Fish falls are classic Foteana, so what's interesting about this story is the number of peole who appear never to have heard of 'em! (Including a meteorologist...)

Something's fishy about local man’s story

By Ron Maloney
The Herald-Zeitung

Published June 05, 2003

Some things are easier to explain than others.

Bob Girten has a fish story like that — not so easy to explain.

His neighbor, Carin Farquhar, called him over the other morning.

“She said, ‘You’ve got to see this. You won’t believe me if I tell you,’” Girten said.

She was right.

Girten had a hard time believing it, but he knew his neighbor. And he knew she wouldn’t make such a story up. He wouldn’t, either.

“It rained awful hard the night before — you couldn’t even see out to the street,” Girten said.

“Where else could they have come from if it didn’t rain them?”

Girten said he’d heard of it raining frogs, but never fish.

“I’m 84 years old, and I’ve never seen this happen before,” Girten said.

Farquhar was leaving on a trip to Canada, so Girten took the fish — a little thing, about four inches long — home. Then he decided to check his yard. He found another fish just like it.

“I asked my daughter. She thinks they might be perch,” Girten said.

“I wish now I’d walked my yard a little more. There might have been more out here, but there are cats all over the place. They wouldn’t be here now,” he said Wednesday.

Police Lt. John Wommack has been around New Braunfels a long time, and he’s heard a lot of fishy stories.

But this is a new one.

In his recollection, no one has ever reported a fish — certainly not two fish — drop out of the sky.

“I’ve read that, but I’ve never had anyone tell it to me,” Wommack said.

“A guy told me about it happening down at the coast — a fish falling out of a whirlwind, and I know there’s also a reference to it in the Bible,” Wommack said.

After a bit, Wommack decided it could happen — that the fish could be siphoned up out of shallow water.

“When you think about it, it makes sense,” Wommack said.

Over at the Comal County Sheriff’s Office, Detective Ronnie Womack is a fish story expert. He said he’s heard of the fish rain phenomenon. Womack thought he’d seen it mentioned on a show on the Arts & Entertainment Network or the Discovery Channel.

“You can probably go look it up on the Internet.

I’ve known it is a phenomenon that does happen. It’s caused by the vortex of a tornado. I’ve seen where a tornado can come over a small pool or pond and can suck that pond dry,” Wommack said. “Then it drops the fish somewhere else.”

National Weather Service Meteorologist Ken Widelski was a little skeptical — at first.

He’s never seen or heard of it raining fish, but he didn’t completely rule it out.

It seemed more plausible as he thought about it, though.

“Likely what happened was you had the fish feeding along the surface. That, with a flood, and maybe they could get on the lawn,” Widelski said.

There had been some rain Sunday night, but no flood, and Girten lives a mile or so from the Guadalupe River.

Riding the surf to Girten’s Sundance Street home wasn’t likely.

“They’d have to be picked up by a swirling wind of some sort. With straight-line winds, it would be tough,” Widelski said.

“In a very severe thunderstorm, you’d likely get 60 or 70-mph winds. If it’s bowing that hard, a horizontal rain could easily transplant things. That happens. We had a storm the next day in San Marcos that was strong enough to cause million in damage and destroy airplanes. I guess it’s possible.”

Girten has no doubt about it.

“I’ll tell you what. This is probably the only time you’ll hear about that. But, by golly, I’ve got the proof!”

http://www.herald-zeitung.com/report.lasso?wcd=6877

 

[Anonymous]

On another messageboard, I've just seen someone post about seeing a local TV news report about fish fall in Louisville on Thursday, but I can't find anything on the intermaweb.

My challenge to you, newshounds, is to see if you can do any better in turning anything up.

 

[rynner2]

Ballina’s flying salmon

The story of the Moy salmon that crashed through the roof of a house in Ballina hit the headlines all over the country, and probably further afield, as news people everywhere latched on to a story that seemed unbelievable.

The picture of Gertie Clarke with the remains of the salmon, beside the hole in the roof of her house, convinced all the doubting Thomases that the fish did crash on to the roof and actually splatter across some of it.
Obviously the “fair sized” salmon must have fallen from some considerable height to have hit the roof with sufficient force to break a slate.

Since the bizarre incident happened on Monday morning, and it appeared in this paper on Tuesday morning, the newsmedia of the country have been highlighting the incident while experts in wildlife have come up with an explanation for the “flying salmon”.
These experts believe that the only possible explanation for the salmon going through the roof is that it was snatched from the nearby Ridge Pool in the Moy by an Osprey.

Osprey are birds that have been visiting this country in increasing numbers in recent years. They usually came to the North and the North East but they have been seen in the Mayo Sligo area.
They are bigger than seagulls and they are noted for diving with talons (feet) first into water to catch fish. And what better feeding ground than the Ridge Pool which has been full with salmon for the past number of weeks!

There have been so many fish in the famous pool that they were a great attraction for visitors who lined the Ham Bridge all day, spotting salmon in the shallow water below.
It was also speculated locally that the salmon may have been taken from the river by an otter and left dead on the river bank where a bird picked it up.
The salmon was medium sized and it is doubtful if any bird other than an Osprey would have been able to carry it.

For “Paws” the expression, lucky as a black cat, came very true when the juicy salmon came crashing on to the roof. Paws, who is a kind of communal cat in Hill Street, had a good feed on the fish from the sky.

It certainly was an ill wind (or, perhaps, an ill Osprey) that caused the tasty morsel to land within yards of its back yard.
The story of the salmon that landed on the roof has now gone into the lore of fishing/angling stories in the area. This one, however, is true and is verified by the pictures.

Pity there is no picture of George, the pet salmon that was talked about on television and radio by the late Pierse Leonard or, indeed, by so many anglers down through the years.

 

[rynner2]

Mystery eggs

BERLIN -- It appears Primo D’Agata of 44 Berldale Ave. received a rare and special -- albeit mysterious -- gift on his porch from what was Hurricane Isabel Friday.

About 10 a.m. he was sitting on his porch reading a newspaper when he heard a sudden burst.

"I thought it was hail and I said to my wife, ‘Ginger, it’s hailing,’" he said. "I went back to reading my paper and then I saw the things were still there and were not melting. I went out and saw hundred of these white things."

The ‘things’ appeared to be eggs of some sort, the size of a pearl, he said.

"They are white with what looks like eyes in the middle. They looked like salamanders or barley," D’Agata said. "Ginger picked one up and it was slimy."

Not knowing what the creatures were, he called Berlin Animal Control officer Jan Lund. Lund and D’Agata brought some of the hundreds of eggs left on his porch to the Museum at Hungerford Park.

"We were told whatever the eggs were, they were not from Connecticut because nothing like that is hatching this time of year," D’Agata said. "They said it was brought in from Hurricane Isabel. He said they could be alligator eggs."

From there, D’Agata brought the jar to Central Connecticut State University.

"They didn’t know what they were either," D’Agata said. "I joked that they could be aliens. They came from the sky with the rain and not the wind."

Later CCSU representatives came to D’Agata’s home and took more samples in a jar with rain water.

"At this point we are still trying to determine what species it is. We have a couple of graduate students who have more experience researching it, but they still don’t have a specific identification," said Ruth Rollin, chairman of the CCSU biological department. "It’s unusual for eggs to be out of water. It does initially look like the egg of an amphibian such as a frog but we need to continue researching to see if that is correct."

Whatever the eggs are, D’Agata said, when the weather cleared up by afternoon Friday the eggs seem to disintegrate or disappear.

"I never saw anything like it in my whole life," D’Agata said. "It’s amazing. People on either side of my home do not have these eggs."

D’Agata is keeping a few in a jar to see if they hatch.

"They are probably dead, but I just want to see what happens," he said. "I want to know what they are."

 

[rynner2]

Eggs were frogs

BERLIN -- Eggs that mysteriously fell from the sky after Hurricane Isabel onto one single porch in town Sept. 19 have been identified as coming from frogs.

"We have found that they are probably some kind of egg, but we do not know what species (of frog)," said Ruth Rollin, chairman of the Central Connecticut State University biology department. "In order to be sure, they would have had to live."

Rollin said that though the eggs were dead when tested, it does appear the eggs came from the hurricane’s winds as she does not believe the species is from any known in Connecticut.

"To do further identification, the eggs would have to grow and hatch," Rollin said. "They did not live long enough for that to happen."

Berlin resident Primo Dagata was reading his newspaper Sept. 19 when he heard what he thought was hail on his front porch. Upon further investigation, he saw hundreds to thousands of eggs on the porch. He said they looked like "salamanders or barley."

He had taken them in a jar to the New Britain Youth Museum at Hungerford Park in Kensington. There, he was told that they came from the storm and was amphibian eggs. The possibility of the eggs being alligator eggs were discussed.

The jar of eggs was later brought to CCSU, which sent graduate students to take samples of the eggs in rainwater directly from the porch.

Since then, the study has been ongoing, but Rollin said it cannot go any further at this point.

"I think they came up from a wind tunnel or up in the clouds," D’Agata said. "The funny part is there is none on the deck, but when it rains they come out like little pearls."

Last Sunday during the rainstorm, the family tried to sweep them off the porch and hosed it down.

D’Agata said the eggs he has kept in a jar have hatched to a degree. They now have a long white tail and green heads. But, he said, he cannot tell if they are alive.

The interest in the eggs is growing as residents are questioning what kind of eggs fell on the porch, he said.

"The grandson of a neighbor has taken some of the eggs to school and is researching them," D’Agata said. "He is doing it as a school project. They are studying about frogs and tadpoles."

CCSU officials told him that the eggs are neither contaminated nor toxic, D’Agata said.

 

[brianellwood]

When on holiday in Southport as a kid one very hot day, I saw a dust devil sweeping along the sand, lifting up all sorts of litter to quite a height. As it came nearer, it got stronger and overtook a small dog which was barking at it, lifting the dog up about 6 feet or so and dropping it a bit further along ( the dog wasn't injured). As the mini whirlwind reached the beach road it simply subsided. If such a small thing can lift a dog, then surely fish, frogs etc. should be easy, although just one fish would be more likely to be a bird drop.

 

[Anonymous]

If such a small thing can lift a dog, then surely fish, frogs etc. should be easy, although just one fish would be more likely to be a bird drop.

yes indeed but there is a problem with fish etc... well why only fish? I would expect the swept up things to be seperated into diferent weights in the wind, rather like swirling sand when panning for gold. Ok so fish of the same size are in one bit and get dropped on one place.... but wheres the water weed?.. wheres the sand and stuff?... are fish uniquely sort of wind magnetic?..

 

[marianne718]

I would expect the swept up things to be seperated into diferent weights in the wind, rather like swirling sand when panning for gold. Ok so fish of the same size are in one bit and get dropped on one place.... but wheres the water weed?.. wheres the sand and stuff?... are fish uniquely sort of wind magnetic?..

I'd guess that yes indeed the water and sand and stuff could be lifted and deposited somewhere else, but without a lab analysis, how would you know the difference between what was there originally and what is newly arrived? However, a "fish out of water" so to speak, is pretty obviously not native.

More to your point, it probably happens far more often than we realize but unless something unusual grabs our attention--crabs, fish, frog eggs, etc.--we're not aware of it.

 

[Mighty_Emperor]

Flying moose lands on car's roof

A leisurely Sunday drive came to an abrupt halt for a couple in southern Norway over the weekend, when a fully grown moose suddenly landed on the roof of their car.

He and his wife were cruising along the two-lane Highway 405 in their little red Mazda. The couple was a few kilometers south of Vatnestrom in Iveland township, Aust-Agder, when their involuntary encounter with the moose took place.

The moose, a female weighing some 350 kilos (770 pounds), apparently had been running through the forest when she suddenly came upon a cliff leading down to the highway.

Unable to stop, the moose seemed to literally fly off the cliff, landing first on the Henriksen's car before catapulting further into the oncoming lane.

The moose-versus-motorist drama ended when Randi Olsen, driving in the oncoming lane with her young daughter, was unable to stop and hit the moose that was now lying in the road.

The moose was dead when wildlife authorities arrived on the scene. Henriksen suffered minor hand injuries, while his wife and the Olsens emerged from the incident without a scratch. Both cars, however, were severely damaged.

Henriksen told the Kristiansand newspaper Faedrelandsvennen that he and his wife lost their house in a fire in mid-January. Now they've lost their car as well, and were hoping for a sympathetic meeting with their insurance agent on Monday.

http://www.aftenposten.no/english/local/article.jhtml?articleID=496559

 

[Mighty_Emperor]

Storms May Have Carried Something 'Fishy'

North Richland Hills Man's Dog Finds Fresh Fish In Back Yard

POSTED: 10:50 am CST March 5, 2004
UPDATED: 3:14 pm CST March 5, 2004

FORT WORTH, Texas -- An NBC 5 viewer in northeast Tarrant County discovered something fishy during Thursday's storms.

The viewer, only known as Erik Breitinger, said he was watching television Thursday afternoon in his North Richland Hills home in the 7200 block of Chatham Road when he noticed a fishy smell in his living room. He looked down to find a "very fresh looking blue gill fish on the floor," he said.

"[My] puppy, Rocket, had found [it] in the back yard and brought into the house," he said.

Erik said he is left to wonder whether the fish ended up in a city that is miles from a body of water because of high winds during Thursday's severe storms.

Severe weather has been known to carry items for long distances.

http://www.nbc5i.com/weather/2899952/detail.html

 

[Bullseye]

Re: Any frog/fish falls recently?

Maybe I've been reading the wrong papers, but I've not heard of any frog or fish rains recently. Has anyone else?

No but I've heard rumours about a three headed frog .........................I'll get my coat.

 

[Mighty_Emperor]

Fishy goings-on in back garden

A FISH out of water in Normanton has left members of a naturalists' society scratching their heads and wondering whether its 'sturgeon' on the ridiculous.

A seven-inch Atlantic sturgeon was found lying on the lawn at the rear of a house on Foxholes Lane, Normanton.

But the sturgeon could have come from an ornamental fishpond according to the man aiming to make Wakefield the caviar capital of Britain.

Peter Barritt, treasurer of Castleford & District Natur-alists' Society, was called in to try to identify the fish, and was shocked to find it was a sturgeon.

He said: "How this fish came to be in a West Yorkshire garden is a mystery. Perhaps it was dropped by a bird which could not swallow it due to the hard triangular formations on its back."

He also wondered whether it could have come from a local fish farm or if there were any caviar-producing fish in the River Calder.
A caviar fish farm is being built at Calder Vale, but project manager Terry Rutter said: "It is not one of ours.

"We are still operating from Huddersfield as we are waiting for the lease to go through in Wakefield.

"Our sturgeon are two-and-a-half feet long. This one could easily have been picked up by a bird from a garden pond. An awful lot of sturgeon are now being imported for ornamental ponds."

http://www.wakefieldtoday.co.uk/ViewArticle2.aspx?SectionID=706&ArticleID=783488

 

[CygnusRex]

Fish fall from sky during O.S. thunderstorm

By KAREN NELSON and MARY LOUISE MASON

OCEAN SPRINGS - Something fishy happened during the hailstorm that pounded the city Tuesday evening.

Gulf Islands National Seashore Ranger Melissa Perez and volunteer Adam Wilson were pelted briefly with small, very cold fish while on the park's pier.

It was around 6 p.m. Tuesday when the storm had eased briefly. The two ran out to try and locate minnow traps that had been left on the pier.

The traps were gone, but while Perez and Wilson were looking, something began falling into the water near them causing splashes. Then two icy cold fish hit the deck of the pier and one hit Perez's hat.

"I was pretty upset that I had lost those traps, when fish fell from the sky," Perez said.

"We went for cover. One was incredibly cold and one of them actually was icy," she said. Fellow workers told her it was a rare phenomenon.

"But sure enough, it happened here," she said.

Perez didn't know how many fell into the water; the event took her by surprise. But it all happened in an area that had roughly a 20-foot diameter.

The fish that hit the deck were small, about 3 inches long, and she said that she didn't immediately recognize the species.

"The weather was so bad that we threw them off and ran for cover," she said.

Todd Adams, assistant coordinator of educational programs at J.S. Scott Marine Education Center, has a degree in physical geography and a master's in geo-science.

He ventured two possibilities: The storm could have pulled the small fish into the thundercloud where they were coated with ice until they got heavy enough to fall from the cloud or the storm could have sucked them off a fishing boat and dropped them at the park.

"Obviously there was hail," Adams said. "And a water spout will pull up and throw all types of things."

Adams, like other motorists Tuesday in Ocean Springs, experienced the storm along U.S. 90. He said the wind was blowing in one direction and then another, in a vortex action.

Debbie Anglin, another Ocean Springs resident, said she waited out what she thought was the worst of the storm at a church downtown. She left and encountered hail on Government Street near the high school at around 6 p.m., about the time the fish were falling a couple of miles east.

She said motorists were pulling over at Oak Park Elementary and at a service station on Halstead Road, where there was protection.

"I went creeping along," she said. "The hail that hit me was bigger than marbles, bouncing off the hood and hitting the windshield."

She said it sounded like rocks hitting her car.

Police Chief Kerry Belk said his department on Wednesday assessed and repaired damaged to its phone system, which was struck by lightning during the storm and went out for several minutes on Tuesday.

An awning from The 19th Hole driving range on U.S. 90 blew off and hit a mobile home in an RV park next door, he said, and there was flash flooding in several neighborhoods, including Woodhaven.

"It was a very bad storm and a very dangerous storm," Belk said. "We're thankful that there wasn't more damage throughout the city."

Original Story

 

[Melf]

fishfalls

http://www.sunherald.com/mld/sunherald/news/9156746.htm

Posted on Thu, Jul. 15, 2004
WEATHER

Fish fall from sky during O.S. thunderstorm

By KAREN NELSON and MARY LOUISE MASON

OCEAN SPRINGS - Something fishy happened during the hailstorm that pounded the city Tuesday evening.
Gulf Islands National Seashore Ranger Melissa Perez and volunteer Adam Wilson were pelted briefly with small, very cold fish while on the park's pier.
It was around 6 p.m. Tuesday when the storm had eased briefly. The two ran out to try and locate minnow traps that had been left on the pier.
The traps were gone, but while Perez and Wilson were looking, something began falling into the water near them causing splashes. Then two icy cold fish hit the deck of the pier and one hit Perez's hat.
"I was pretty upset that I had lost those traps, when fish fell from the sky," Perez said.
"We went for cover. One was incredibly cold and one of them actually was icy," she said. Fellow workers told her it was a rare phenomenon.
"But sure enough, it happened here," she said.
Perez didn't know how many fell into the water; the event took her by surprise. But it all happened in an area that had roughly a 20-foot diameter.
The fish that hit the deck were small, about 3 inches long, and she said that she didn't immediately recognize the species.
"The weather was so bad that we threw them off and ran for cover," she said.
Todd Adams, assistant coordinator of educational programs at J.S. Scott Marine Education Center, has a degree in physical geography and a master's in geo-science.
He ventured two possibilities: The storm could have pulled the small fish into the thundercloud where they were coated with ice until they got heavy enough to fall from the cloud or the storm could have sucked them off a fishing boat and dropped them at the park.
"Obviously there was hail," Adams said. "And a water spout will pull up and throw all types of things."
Adams, like other motorists Tuesday in Ocean Springs, experienced the storm along U.S. 90. He said the wind was blowing in one direction and then another, in a vortex action.
Debbie Anglin, another Ocean Springs resident, said she waited out what she thought was the worst of the storm at a church downtown. She left and encountered hail on Government Street near the high school at around 6 p.m., about the time the fish were falling a couple of miles east.
She said motorists were pulling over at Oak Park Elementary and at a service station on Halstead Road, where there was protection.
"I went creeping along," she said. "The hail that hit me was bigger than marbles, bouncing off the hood and hitting the windshield."
She said it sounded like rocks hitting her car.
Police Chief Kerry Belk said his department on Wednesday assessed and repaired damaged to its phone system, which was struck by lightning during the storm and went out for several minutes on Tuesday.
An awning from The 19th Hole driving range on U.S. 90 blew off and hit a mobile home in an RV park next door, he said, and there was flash flooding in several neighborhoods, including Woodhaven.
"It was a very bad storm and a very dangerous storm," Belk said. "We're thankful that there wasn't more damage throughout the city."





so where are the minnow traps?

 

[FraterLibre]

Fish Fall in Mississippi

Rense.com



Fish Fall From Sky
During Thunderstorm
By Karen Nelson and Mary Louise Mason
Biloxi (Miss.) Sun Herald
7-16-4


OCEAN SPRINGS - Something fishy happened during the hailstorm that pounded the city Tuesday evening.

Gulf Islands National Seashore Ranger Melissa Perez and volunteer Adam Wilson were pelted briefly with small, very cold fish while on the park's pier.

It was around 6 p.m. Tuesday when the storm had eased briefly. The two ran out to try and locate minnow traps that had been left on the pier.

The traps were gone, but while Perez and Wilson were looking, something began falling into the water near them causing splashes. Then two icy cold fish hit the deck of the pier and one hit Perez's hat.

"I was pretty upset that I had lost those traps, when fish fell from the sky," Perez said.

"We went for cover. One was incredibly cold and one of them actually was icy," she said. Fellow workers told her it was a rare phenomenon.

"But sure enough, it happened here," she said.

Perez didn't know how many fell into the water; the event took her by surprise. But it all happened in an area that had roughly a 20-foot diameter.

The fish that hit the deck were small, about 3 inches long, and she said that she didn't immediately recognize the species.

"The weather was so bad that we threw them off and ran for cover," she said.

Todd Adams, assistant coordinator of educational programs at J.S. Scott Marine Education Center, has a degree in physical geography and a master's in geo-science.

He ventured two possibilities: The storm could have pulled the small fish into the thundercloud where they were coated with ice until they got heavy enough to fall from the cloud or the storm could have sucked them off a fishing boat and dropped them at the park.

"Obviously there was hail," Adams said. "And a water spout will pull up and throw all types of things."

Adams, like other motorists Tuesday in Ocean Springs, experienced the storm along U.S. 90. He said the wind was blowing in one direction and then another, in a vortex action.

Debbie Anglin, another Ocean Springs resident, said she waited out what she thought was the worst of the storm at a church downtown. She left and encountered hail on Government Street near the high school at around 6 p.m., about the time the fish were falling a couple of miles east.

She said motorists were pulling over at Oak Park Elementary and at a service station on Halstead Road, where there was protection.

"I went creeping along," she said. "The hail that hit me was bigger than marbles, bouncing off the hood and hitting the windshield."

She said it sounded like rocks hitting her car.

Police Chief Kerry Belk said his department on Wednesday assessed and repaired damaged to its phone system, which was struck by lightning during the storm and went out for several minutes on Tuesday.

An awning from The 19th Hole driving range on U.S. 90 blew off and hit a mobile home in an RV park next door, he said, and there was flash flooding in several neighborhoods, including Woodhaven.

"It was a very bad storm and a very dangerous storm," Belk said. "We're thankful that there wasn't more damage throughout the city."

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/9160825.htm?1c




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[SoundDust]

fish raining article from the bbc

The latest in a series of bizarre British weather phenomena is a rain of fish. It may sound like the stuff of legend, but such events are increasingly well documented.
On Wednesday, the village of Knighton, in Powys, was reported to have endured such a fishy deluge. Not a story easily believed - an odd site for a Biblical-style plague, one might think, perhaps to be followed by the waters of the nearby River Teme running red with blood?

But in fact, as the Met Office explains, such occurrences are not as uncommon as they may sound. Not only are they not quite the miraculous events that they seem, rains of fish - and other even more surprising objects - are reported with some frequency.

 

[Anonymous]

Fish Fall in Knighton

The Daily Mail, in the midst of this story about the weather, claims that "In Knighton, Herefordshire, locals reported a shoal of fish raining down during a storm."

The BBC's Radio Hereford and Worcester alerted me to this tale this morning and claims it happened in the middle of the week.

 

[Mighty_Emperor]

Well spoted!!! More on that:

It's raining cats, dogs and occasionally fish

By Susannah Osborne
(Filed: 20/08/2004)


...............

The unpredictable weather took a bizarre twist yesterday when fish fell from the sky in Knighton, Shropshire.

The Met Office said: "Lightweight items like a fish or a small frog may be caught in a strong storm and cloud updrafts, rising higher and higher until it is thrown out or drops like a hailstone."

Source

Fish rain from sky in town


There's something fishy going on with the weather in Mid Wales where instead of raining cats and dogs - one town was hit by a storm of fish.

At about 2.30pm yesterday members of the Knighton Writers were arriving at the St Edward's Close social room for their latest meeting.

But following a brief thunderstorm, the group was stunned to find a number of small fish had apparently rained out of the sky and were lying on a paved area outside the building - nowhere near the River Teme.

A spokesman for the Met Office said: "If the item is lightweight like a fish or a small frog, it may be caught in the strong storm/cloud updrafts for a long time, rising higher and higher until it is finally thrown out or drops out like a hailstone."

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The full version of this story appears in some
editions of tonight's Shropshire Star

http://www.shropshirestar.com/news/publish/article_21602.shtml

The Beeb really go to ton with a graphic (attached) and an explanation:

How can it rain fish?

By Edward Green

The latest in a series of bizarre British weather phenomena is a rain of fish. It may sound like the stuff of legend, but such events are increasingly well documented.

On Wednesday, the village of Knighton, in Powys, was reported to have endured such a fishy deluge. Not a story easily believed - an odd site for a Biblical-style plague, one might think, perhaps to be followed by the waters of the nearby River Teme running red with blood?

But in fact, as the Met Office explains, such occurrences are not as uncommon as they may sound. Not only are they not quite the miraculous events that they seem, rains of fish - and other even more surprising objects - are reported with some frequency.

1. Fish are picked up from lake
2. Cloud moves over urban area and drops fish

They even provided the inspiration for some of the events in the 1999 Paul Anderson film Magnolia, which went to the extreme of having a diver falling from the sky.

That may be going too far, assures a Met Office spokesman. Fish are the most common thing to have rained down on you - other than rain itself, of course. Rains of frogs have also been known, as have such strange items as tomatoes and even lumps of coal.

The phenomenon can be explained simply: given strong enough winds, in thunderstorms for example, small whirlwinds and mini-tornadoes may form. When these travel over water any small items of debris in their path, such as fish or frogs, may be picked up and carried for up to several miles.

Sooner or later, the clouds carrying them will open and drop their strange cargo - resulting in a hail of fish, frogs or whatever the winds happened to pick up.

Weird rains are not limited to Britain - they have been recorded all over the world, throughout the ages. Pliny the Elder, writing in the first century AD, mentioned storms of frogs and fish.

Some believe that these events may give a clue to the origin of the plague of frogs recorded in the Book of Exodus. Two US scientists have come up with an explanation of the 10 plagues of Egypt as a series of linked natural disasters - each following as a result of the other.

So perhaps the residents of Knighton should continue to keep a nervous eye on the river water.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/3582802.stm

Published: 2004/08/20 12:46:54 GMT

© BBC MMIV

 

[Angel_Fish]

Rains of Frogs on the BBC

I don't know if anyone else caught this, but the Radio Four programme "Questions Questions" had a short section on rains of frogs and so on, including an soundbite from the FT's own Bob Rickard!
It's brief and basic, but might be interesting for those of you in the field...

You can listen again here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/progs/listenagain.shtml#q (the "questions questions link there will work until the 13th)
It's about 8 mins in or so.

 

[Stormkhan]

I was listening to this while at work. Great stuff! Michael Fish was toeing the line about the waterspout/storm theory but he seemed wonderfully blase about strange falls.

Nice idea that he reckons they happen every couple of years and - considering the recent climate changes - we're in for some really wierd stuff!

 

[escargot]

I too heard the frog prog. Great stuff.

(The BF was caught in a fall of frogs on a footy pitch as a kid.
Hundreds of frogs were seen to fall from the sky during heavy rain. They were croaking loudly and they all hopped away perfectly healthily. In Congleton, about 1974.)