Animal
‘Beach Aliens’ Pictures Sparked Panic As People Rush To Identify What It Is
“Is it safe to go into the water?”
A man based in the Western Cape of South Africa, sparked panic when he shared cryptic pictures of spider-like objects lining up at the beach. Jan Vorster, a frequent beachgoer in Still Bay shared the shocking snaps on Facebook, prompting people to call it “beach aliens.”
Vorster didn’t mean to scare the public with alien invasion post: he meant to raise awareness for environmental issues through the pictures.
The pictures were quickly reshared after it was tagged with “Still Bay” geolocation with over 53k shares on Facebook, hundreds of concerned comments accompanied with people joking over how this is a “War of the Worlds” foreshadowing.
One commented, “Omg I wouldn’t even stay to try and see what it is. I would run like hell.”
But another joked, “They look like some alien thing from ‘War of the Worlds’ with Tom Cruise.”
All jokes aside, we’re serious when we say people are concerned because Vorster has received several messages from many fearful of going to the beach now.
And some had the pictures sent to an environmental scientist to get a look over and tell them what these are. Bloated squids? Sea spiders rising from the dead?! Cthulhu’s offsprings?!
Actually, these are dead aloe vera plants.
So yeah, obviously, nobody is in danger.
The poster shared, “I thought I could use this as a metaphor for how people see these plants as aliens, but we are actually the two-legged aliens messing up their world. That was the idea.”
“The comments started immediately. Then it was shared like you can’t believe. I was surprised. I thought that people would have fun with it, but then it was very serious, some of it was extremely serious.”
“A lot of people were scared of these alien-looking sea monsters. It was like ‘Jaws’ – is it safe to go into the water? People kept asking me when they were coming out, and if they were only coming out at night.”
Funny enough, some blamed him for misleading them “and that I should be crucified for that.”
“They kept saying, ‘Please help us, because this is not a plant. This can’t be a plant,” he continued.
