‘They’re heeerrreee’: Social media reacts to the return of the 17-year cicadas

Cicadas are back in a big way and people have taken to social media to share their reactions to the insect invasion.

Following a 17-year hibernation, billions of the winged creatures are expected to make a prominent return to the East Coast and Midwest, with sightings already reported in states like Virginia, Maryland and Georgia.

The bugs are just beginning to emerge from underground, but already the sound of their familiar alien-like mating call can be heard outdoors across several states.

Rebecca Keenan shared a video on Twitter of her 12-year-old daughter’s reaction to a cicada shedding it’s exoskeleton, spotted in their front yard. Children like Keenan’s daughter will be experiencing the cicadas for the first time in their young lives this summer.

Pablo Vidal-Ribas got a close up of some newly above-ground cicadas in Bethesda, Maryland, and announced in a tweet, “They are here!”

“It’s such a unique experience because they really take over for a month or so,” John Cooley, an entomologist at the University of Connecticut, told NBC News. “There may be trillions of ants around, but most of the time you don’t pay any attention to them. These are big, loud, funny-looking, charismatic and active insects, and you really can’t ignore them.”

Video from Fairfax, Virginia, captured one of those “big, loud, funny-looking” bugs as it shuffled around on the ground.

Similarly, another Twitter user in Maryland shared video of a cicada siting video with the warning that, in just a few weeks time, there will be “tons of these guys.”

To drive home that you’ll have to watch your step in the coming weeks, Linda Hosler in Fort Hunt, Virginia, tweeted this video of a sidewalk littered with cicadas, adding, “They’re heeerrreee.”

The cicadas emerging this cycle are known as Brood X, and will have just a few weeks to find a mate and lay eggs before they die, meaning it will be a busy summer for the insect.

Regions with a cicada surge should expect plenty of noise coming from the billions that will eventually make their way to the surface, but the insects are harmless and will only be here for a short time before making their descent back underground for another several years.