'Unbelievable': Army ants make bridge to ransack wasp's nest in a 'raid' | Watch

Footage of an army of ants raiding wasp’s giant nest by transcending into a bridge in Brazil has left the viewers on the internet awe-struck. The colony with millions of ants swarmed through a neighbourhood balcony from the ceiling by forming a hanging bridge, at first difficult to identify, in order to ransack the wasp’s home. The astonishing footage was originally captured and shared by a Brazilian electrical engineer, Francisco Boni a couple of years ago and has resurfaced, sparking discussions. It was also widely shared across YouTube, Facebook, and other social media platform.

“Attack of legionary ants, also known as army ants or marabunta to a wasp honeycomb. Impressive the level of swarm intelligence and collective computation to form that bridge,” the former wrote while sharing the video.  

Furthermore, the engineer explained that when this type of attack” happens, the wasps usually abandon their nests and escape. He added that the ants do not leave until they’ve completely looted the honeycomb, carrying pupae, larvae, and eggs, as well as some adults who did not manage to escape. “They can even build across the water,” said Boni, sharing separate images of the army ants forming a shape above the water that is titled a little. 

The Brazilian engineer said, that at first, he thought that it was “merely a failure mode” that happened when the ants decided to build the bridge. Or that there was something affecting the trail pheromones as the bridge was tilted. But then, a biologist pointed out that these species of ants have a hard time walking upside down.

And so, it is more effective for the ants to form the trail that goes down first and then up rather than an inverted upside-down walk. Also likely that upside down the ants can’t carry significant loads,” he explained. Aggressively foraging through the densely forested areas for food, these soldier ants move in millions and can kill birds, beetles, critters, lizards, snakes, goats, and other reptiles insects and animals in their path. Some tropically located species may pose threat to humans. 

Why does the bridge not break? 

In a separate hypothesis, a user Diego Gernhofer explained that the ants probably started as a straight path and eventually were joined by other ants. As gravity pulled the whole bunch down,  the bridge took the shape of the hanging bridge, but it doesn’t end up breaking due to linear tension. “So the first minutes they built the bottom part which is less vertical, and then added on the extremes on necessity,” he said. Many viewers pointed out that the ants' bridge was perhaps a catenary curve.