Great balls of snow: Giant snowballs appear on Siberia's coast

close

Video

Rare giant 'snowballs' appear on Siberian beach

Raw video: Natural phenomenon surprises residents after wind and cold weather forms thousands of huge ice spheres in remote Russian village in Arctic Circle

Thousands of giant snowballs have appeared on a remote 11-mile stretch of Russia’s Siberian coastline.

The Sun reports that local people in the village of Nyda on the Yamal Peninsula, just above the Arctic Circle, were stunned to find the strange spheres. Pictures of the snowballs, which range from the size of tennis balls to 3 feet, have gone viral in Russia, it added.

A spokesman for the Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute in Saint Petersburg, Russia, told FoxNews.com that the cold-weather phenomenon occurs sometimes in the shallow waters of northern seas. The ice, which initially forms as a jelly-like paste, is shaped by winds and waves into “a multitude of balls of irregular form and size,” he explained, via email.

RUSSIAN SCIENTISTS UNEARTH REMAINS OF SECRET NAZI ARCTIC BASE

“Surf puts these balls in a coastal zone,” he added. “When low tide comes, balls stay on shore.”

The snowballs first formed in late October, according to LiveScience, citing news reports. Water rose in the Gulf of Ob and covered the beach in ice, it said.

The Sun reports that a similar incident occurred on the Gulf of Finland in December 2014 and on Lake Michigan last year.

RARE WEATHER EVENT PRODUCES SPONTANEOUS SNOWBALLS IN IDAHO

Earlier this year a rare weather event produced thousands of large snowballs in a flat field in central Idaho.

The Russian Arctic also made headlines recently when scientists unearthed the remains of a secret Nazi base on the remote island of Alexandra Land that was abandoned during the latter stages of World War II.

Follow James Rogers on Twitter @jamesjrogers