Raining 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.
The English language idiom "It's raining cats and dogs" (referring to a heavy downpour) is of uncertain etymology; there is no evidence that it has any connection to the "raining animals" phenomenon.
Rain of flightless animals and things has been reported throughout history. In the first century AD, Roman naturalist Pliny The Elder documented storms of frogs and fish. In 1794, French soldiers witnessed toads fall from the sky during heavy rain at Lalain, near the French city of Lille. Rural inhabitants in Yoro, Honduras, claim 'fish rain' happens there every summer, a phenomenon they call Lluvia de Peces.
French physicist André-Marie Ampère (1775 – 1836) was among the first scientists to take seriously accounts of raining animals. Addressing the Society of Natural Sciences, 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.
Sometimes the animals survive the fall, suggesting the animals are dropped shortly after extraction. Several witnesses of raining frogs describe the animals as startled but healthy, and exhibiting relatively normal behavior shortly after the event. In some incidents, the animals are frozen to death or even completely encased in ice. There are examples where the product of the rain is not intact animals, but shredded body parts. Some cases occur just after storms having strong winds, especially during tornadoes. However, there have been many unconfirmed cases in which rainfalls of animals have occurred in fair weather and in the absence of strong winds or waterspouts.
Given that waterspouts do not actually lift anything (the water droplets visible in the column are merely condensation), it is implausible to suggest they are capable of lifting fish from below the surface of the water and high into the sky.
A better accepted scientific explanation involves tornadic waterspouts: a tornado that forms over land and travels 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, and not a group of similarly-sized animals from a single area.
In the case of birds, storms may overcome a flock in flight, especially in times of migration. The 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 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, United States 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, 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.
After a reported rain of fish in Singapore in 1861, French naturalist Francis de Laporte de Castelnau established that a migration of walking catfish had taken place. As these fish are capable of dragging themselves over land from one puddle to another, this accounted for their presence on the ground following the rain.
The following list is a selection of examples.
Singapore, February 22, 1861
Knighton, Powys, Wales, 18 August 2004.
Madhesh, Nepal, May 15, 1900
Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan, Canada, July 1, 1903
Marksville, Louisiana, October 23, 1947
Kerala State, India, February 12, 2008
Bhanwad, Jamnagar, India, Oct 24, 2009
Lajamanu, Northern Territory, Australia, February 25 and 26, 2010,
Loreto, Agusan del Sur, Philippines, January 13, 2012
IIT Madras, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, Sep 12, 2013
The yearly Lluvia de Peces in Yoro, Honduras
Chilaw, Sri Lanka, 6 May 2014
Nandigama, Andhra Pradesh India, 19 June 2015,
Guntur, Andhra Pradesh India, 16 August 2015
Dire Dawa, Ethiopia, 20 January 2016
Pathapatnam, Srikakulam district, Andhra Pradesh, 19 May 2016
Mumbai-Pune Express Highway, Maharashtra India, 12 July 2016
Albury, Australia, 1974
Santo Antônio da Platina, Brazil, February 3, 2013
Goulburn, Australia, 15 May 2015
Frogs and toads
Ishikawa Prefecture, Japan, June 2009 (occurrences reported throughout the month)
Rákóczifalva, Hungary, 18–20 June 2010 (twice)
Jellyfish, Bath, England, 1894
Worms, Jennings, Louisiana, July 11, 2007
In literature and popular culture
Rains of animals (as well as rains of blood or blood-like material, and similar anomalies) play a central role in the epistemological writing of Charles Fort, especially in his first book, The Book of the Damned (1919). Fort collected stories of these events and used them both as evidence and as a metaphor in challenging the claims of scientific explanation.
Other examples:
In anime, comics, and manga
In the sixth part of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure (first introduced in 1986), a character with the power to control weather causes a rain of frogs.
Raining frogs occur in director Peter Weir's film The Last Wave (1977) as one aspect of nature beyond the control or preconceptions of Western science.
Raining fish appear in Luc Besson's film Le Dernier Combat (1983). The main character "The Man" (played by Pierre Jolivet) collects these fish and stores them as food.
In Stephen King's 1989 short story "Rainy Season" and its short film adaptation, giant black toads with needle-sharp teeth, and the ability to chew through doors and walls, rain from the sky.
Raining frogs wreak havoc on drivers and residents in the Paul Thomas Anderson movie Magnolia (1999).
The character Cris Johnson in the film Next (2007) relates as fact that fish eggs were rehydrated after being evaporated from the ocean near Denmark, resulting in a rain of fish.
Ben Singer (played by Matthew Broderick) experiences raining fish at the end of the film Wonderful World (2009), while in Senegal. His close friend Ibu had told him about the phenomenon earlier in the film.
The Syfy channel film series Sharknado (2013), Sharknado 2: The Second One (2014), Sharknado 3: Oh Hell No! (2015), and Sharknado: The 4th Awakens follow this premise, with waterspouts dropping sharks across Los Angeles.
In the role-playing game The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (2006), the player can do an optional quest given by Sheogorath, the Daedric Prince of Madness, which involves playing a prank on a small, peaceful-yet-superstitious village. The player is told to perform certain actions that will fulfill a prophecy within the village that is believed to herald the end of the world, thus causing all of the villagers to panic. The final event foretold in the prophecy is flaming dogs raining from the sky, which, unlike the other events of the prophecy, is achieved by the Daedra Lord himself and his powers.
Fish and leeches fall from the sky in Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami.
A sperm whale and a bowl of petunias are called into existence above the alien planet Magrathea in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (1978) by Douglas Adams. The whale has only moments to come to terms with its brief life as it plummets to its death. The bowl of petunias has been in similarly terminal situations before.
A fish falls from the sky in the opening scene of Andrew Bovell's play When the Rain Stops Falling (2008).
John Hodgman's satirical almanac More Information Than You Require (2008) makes references to multiple events involving raining animals.
Stephen King's short story "Rainy Season" from the collection Nightmares & Dreamscapes (1993) is about frogs with sharp teeth falling from the sky.
The first line of the book Summer Knight (2002), from Jim Butcher's The Dresden Files, reads: "It rained toads...".
Raining animals, caused by magical weather, are relatively common in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series. One small village in the mountainous, landlocked Ramtops operates a successful fish cannery thanks to regular rains of fish. The Omnian religion includes several accounts of religious figures being saved by miraculous rains of animals, one consisting of a single elephant. Other items include bedsteads, coal scuttles, cake, and tinned sardines.
In Fargo season 1, episode 6, "Buridan's Ass" (2014), fish rained from the sky after a severe blizzard in Duluth, Minnesota. The result of the downpour was a single vehicle car crash that killed Dmitri Milos, son of Stavros Milos, and Milos' security man.
The Red Dwarf, episode "Confidence and Paranoia" (1988) features "solid hallucinations". After Lister learns about a historical incident of fish rain, it actually occurs in his sleeping quarters.
In The Sarah Jane Adventures story "The Curse of Clyde Langer" (2011), it rained fish from the sky above Ealing in the west of London due to the influence of an alien entity known as Hetocumtek which had been trapped in a Native American totem pole centuries earlier.
In The X-Files, episode "Die Hand Die Verletzt" (1995), frogs fall from the sky in the area where a demon was apparently summoned and killed a high-school student the night before.
"Raining cats and dogs"
The English idiom "it is raining cats and dogs", used to describe an especially heavy rain, is of unknown etymology, and is not necessarily related to the "raining animals" phenomenon. The phrase (with "polecats" instead of "cats") was used at least since the 17th century. A number of improbable folk etymologies have been put forward to explain the phrase, for example:
An "explanation" widely circulated by email claimed that in 16th-century Europe when peasant homes were commonly thatched, animals could crawl into the thatch to find shelter from the elements, and would fall out during heavy rain. However, there seems to be no evidence in support of either assertion.
Drainage systems on buildings in 17th-century Europe were poor, and may have disgorged their contents during heavy showers, including the corpses of any animals that had accumulated in them. This occurrence is documented in Jonathan Swift's 1710 poem 'Description of a City Shower', in which he describes "Drowned puppies, stinking sprats, all drenched in mud,/Dead cats and turnip-tops come tumbling down the flood."
"Cats and dogs" may be a corruption of the Greek word Katadoupoi, referring to the waterfalls on the Nile, possibly through the old French word catadupe ("waterfall").
The Greek phrase "kata doksa", which means "contrary to expectation" is often applied to heavy rain, but there is no evidence to support the theory that it was borrowed by English speakers.
There may not be a logical explanation; the phrase may have been used just for its nonsensical humor value, like other equivalent English expressions ("it is raining pitchforks", "hammer handles", etc.).
Other languages have equally bizarre expressions for heavy rain:
Afan Oromo: Waaqatu baqaqe ("the sky got torned")
Afrikaans: ou vrouens met knopkieries reën ("old women with clubs")
Bengali: মুষলধারে বৃষ্টি পড়ছে musholdhare brishṭi poṛchhe ("in a stream of mallets")
Bosnian: padaju ćuskije ("crowbars")
Bosnian: lije ko iz kabla ("it's pouring like from a bucket")
Cantonese: "落狗屎" ("dog poo")
Chinese: "倾盆大雨" ("its pouring out of basins")
Catalan: Ploure a bots i barrals ("boats and barrels")
Croatian: padaju sjekire ("axes dropping")
Czech: padají trakaře ("wheelbarrows")
Czech: leje jako z konve ("like from a watering can")
Danish: det regner skomagerdrenge ("shoemakers' apprentices")
Dutch: het regent pijpenstelen ("pipe stems or stair rods")
Dutch (Flemish): het regent oude wijven ("old women")
Dutch (Flemish): het regent kattenjongen ("kittens")
Finnish: Sataa kuin Esterin perseestä ("It's raining like from Esteri's ass")
Finnish: Sataa kuin saavista kaatamalla ("It's raining like poured from a bucket")
French: il pleut comme vache qui pisse ("it is raining like a peeing cow")
French: il pleut des seaux ("it's raining buckets")
French: il pleut des hallebardes ("it is raining halberds"), clous ("nails"), or cordes ("ropes")
German: Es regnet junge Hunde ("young dogs") or Es schüttet wie aus Eimern ("like poured from buckets")
Greek: βρέχει καρεκλοπόδαρα ("chair legs")
Hindi: मुसलधार बारिश (musaldhār bārish) ("a stream of mallets")
Hungarian: mintha dézsából öntenék ("like poured from a vat")
Icelandic: Það rignir eins og hellt sé úr fötu ("like poured from a bucket")
Kannada:ಮುಸಲಧಾರೆ, ಕುಂಭದ್ರೋಣ ಮಳೆ ("a stream of mallets")
Italian: piove a catinelle ("poured from a basin")
Latvian: līst kā no spaiņiem ("it's raining like from buckets")
Malayalam: പേമാരി pemari ("mad rain")
Marathi: मुसळधार पाउस("a stream of mallets")
Nepali: मुसलधारे झरी ("a stream of mallets")
Norwegian: det regner trollkjerringer ("she-trolls")
Polish: leje jak z cebra ("like from a bucket")
Portuguese: chovem or está chovendo/a chover canivetes ("penknives")
Portuguese: chove a potes/baldes ("it is raining by the pot/bucket load")
Portuguese: chove a cântaros/canecos ("it is raining by the jug load")
Portuguese (Brazil): chovem cobras e lagartos ("snakes and lizards")
Portuguese (Brazil): está caindo um pau-d'água ("a stick of water is falling")
Portuguese (Brazil): está caindo um pé-d'água ("a foot of water is falling")
Romanian: plouă cu broaşte ("raining frogs")
Romanian: plouă cu găleata ("from a bucket")
Russian: льет как из ведра ("from a bucket")
Spanish: están lloviendo chuzos de punta ("shortpikes/icicles point first" - not only is it raining a lot, but it's so cold and windy that being hit by the drops hurts)
Spanish: está lloviendo a cántaros ("by the clay pot-full")
Spanish: llueven sapos y culebras ("toads and snakes")
Spanish (Argentina): caen soretes de punta ("pieces of dung head-first")
Spanish (Venezuela): está cayendo un palo de agua ("a stick of water is falling")
Spanish (Colombia): estan lloviendo maridos ("it's raining husbands")
Serbian: padaju sekire ("axes")
Swedish: Det regnar smådjävlar ("It is raining little devils")
Swedish: Det regnar småspik ("It is raining small nails")
Swedish: regnet står som spön i backen ("the rain stands like canes hitting the ground")
Tamil: பேய் மழை pei mazhi ("Ghost rain")
Telugu: కుండపోత వర్షం kundapotha varsham ("Torrential rain")
Turkish: bardaktan boşanırcasına ("like poured from a cup")
Urdu: musladhār bārish ("a stream of mallets")
Welsh: mae hi'n bwrw hen wragedd a ffyn ("old ladies and sticks")
