Huge icy hailstones have been branded 'a sign from the almighty to stay home' in Mexico.
Locals shared images of the weather event on social media, commenting on the curious formation of the hailstones which they compared to the shape of the coronavirus.
The particles of coronavirus in humans are usually spherical and typically have big crown-like spikes.
The bad weather 'omen' was reported in the municipality of Montemorelos in Mexico.
According to the meteorologist and consultant of the World Meteorologist Organisation, Jose Miguel Vinas, the peculiar shape of the hailstone is actually a frequent occurrence in storms of magnitude.
Miguel Vinas told local media: "Inside a storm, a hailstone will start off as a small spherical form and accumulate layers of ice on top.
"During very strong storms when the hailstone are already quite big and smash together, many of them fuse together, smashing together and squashing each other, forming spikes of ice.
"So what is falling is a squashed disks of ice, smashed into that shape by a violent blow or the fusing of different sized hailstones, which results in this star shape."
One social media user called Darlene' posted: "Yesterday coronavirus hailstone, God sent it to our home to remind us to stay put."
Another person commented: "Is this a subliminal message from our creator? "
According to the latest figures from the Johns Hopkins University, Mexico has registered 51,633 cases of COVID-19 and 5,332 related deaths.
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