Countering the popular belief that Australia is a scorching-hot island paradise, a video has emerged claiming that the chilly nights are freezing - literally. People online watched in disbelief as tap water turned into a standing icicle as it came out.
The video was posted by Kate Norton-Smith from the state of New South Wales on YouTube this Sunday, claiming that the weird phenomenon is taking place in a country where people continue wearing shorts and skimpy tops during the winter’s days.
"This is what happened when we turned on our HOT water tap on a chilly Sunday morning in Albury, NSW," she wrote in the description.
The comments that emerged were hilarious. One Swedish LiveLeaker wrote “daaaaaaaaamn, my beers would LOVE to have a tap like that”. One American poster called the whole thing a fake, saying “I live in a cold area and water would not freeze like that. I'm guessing it could be something like the powder used in diapers.”
“I'd check your plumbing - I'm in New Zealand right now & our water doesn't do this. I'm also from Canada, where we get REAL winter (i.e. -30C), and water doesn't do this,” one user wrote on YouTube.
Supercooled water could do the trick, although it would have to be crystal clear to get to that state. A supersaturated salt solution would produce a similar effect. But it’s hard to imagine that either would appear in a tap, so it’s either a prank, or a mystery which remains to be solved.