A stunned resident captured the moment his city was swarmed by hundreds of thousands of small birds, which left many worried it might be a sign of an earthquake or other natural disasters.

The impressive flock was filmed flying in the night sky above Jiexin Park, in south-eastern China’s Fujian Province.

Phone footage shows countless birds swarming the space above the streets as they were illuminated with a mesmerizing yellow glow from the city lights.

Being small and extremely close together, they almost appear like heavy snowflakes being carried by the wind.

Locals said the spectacle is not a first but has been occurring every evening around seven or eight o’clock for the past two weeks.

They added it takes about half an hour for the entire flock to pass by and added there are so many birds that the sound of their wings is almost deafening.

The peculiar occurrence has sparked online debates, with many users on Douyin – China’s version of TikTok – worrying if it might be a bad omen.

One user titled ‘Passionate’ said in a comment: “Everyone should pay attention, the birds’ behaviour is to remind us human beings of some kind of danger.”

And ‘Miss Hui’ commented: “In the years when I was a child, whenever there was an earthquake warning and we set up earthquake shelters, there would be a lot of sparrows. They would gather densely on the big trees.”

While user ‘oooooooooooo means duck’ jokingly wrote: “Knowing the high housing prices in Fujian, they must be flying to cheaper cities.”

Others, however, speculated the phenomenon might be related to the city’s proximity to the coastline and believe the birds are simply migrating from colder areas.