You can add giant swarms of flying ants to your terrifying-sounding bug bingo card in 2020 along with killer hornets and noisy cicada hordes.
© Met Office
It is not rain, it is a swarm of flying ants.
The UK Met Office shared radar images showing ants flying over the south-eastern part of the country.
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“It is not raining in London, Kent or Sussex, but our radar says otherwise,” he said in a tweet on Friday.
It looked like rain on radar, but a meteorologist with the country’s meteorological agency said it was “dry, hot and sunny” at the time. The swarm was visible on radar for about two hours on Friday morning.
The forecasters’ satellites did not show enough clouds to produce rain in the area, he said.
They were suspected of insects because the particles did not look like raindrops and were longer than they were wide, like an insect.
Her hunch was confirmed when people in the area began posting about the swarm with the hashtags #flyingants and #flyingantday.
There were also reports across the eastern part of the country that did not appear on radar, he said.
Ants have become a summer tradition in Britain and many people call their annual Flying Ant Day appearance.
The phenomenon occurs when young queen ants, followed by males, leave their nests to reproduce and start new colonies. The weather conditions must be right, which is why so many ants choose to take off at the same time, according to the Royal Society of Biology (RSB).
They can be annoying, but ants are also good for the environment, according to the RSB. They improve soil fertility and aerate the soil so that more water, oxygen, and nutrients can reach plant roots and end up as food for birds and other predators.
Ants are not harmful, so the RSB suggests ignoring them until they fly alone.
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