It's raining fish in Texas

On December 31st Texas got more than just a bunch of people hanging around a drinking probably too much, they also got a really odd surprise when it started to rain. Mixed in with the water that was falling from the sky were fish, some as large as 4 and 5 inches long.

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It sounds like something that is made up and most people would probably assume that it is, this is why the city of Texarkana had press releases that said "This is not a joke" in their headlines. I had seen something similar to this in a film called Magnolia years ago where it starts raining frogs at the end of it and I presumed that this was just some sort of science fiction something or other.

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Of course the film took it to a complete ridiculous level because that is what films do. However, this is a phenomenon that isn't really all that rare as it turns out. It is just rare that it is creatures that are big enough for us to notice and to cause damage to property to be part of the situation. By the way, Magnolia is an excellent film that I recommend you see.

Back to the science that I was unaware of until I read this story in the news: What happens is that a tornado or a tornado like updraft occurs somewhere and it is so strong that it sucks a bunch of water and all the creatures that are in it up into the sky. We tend to focus on the power that these things have when they are on the ground but their force actually extends well up into the sky and it doesn't let up.

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_{not the same event, but the only visual representation I could find}

Sometimes, these fish or frogs or whatever can be carried many miles from where they started before the power of the storm runs out and then gravity takes over. Obviously none of these animals can survive this but it must have been a wild ride for the fish for the little bit of time that they were alive during it.

There is some talk out there in internet-land that this natural phenomenon could be responsible for some amount of biblical or other religious stories about signs of incoming plagues or other things that indicate that whatever god they worship was upset with them. I know that in the days before science if it all of a sudden started raining fish I would think there was something terribly terribly wrong so I suppose this superstitious outlook is understandable.