Seventeen years ago, President Bill Clinton was acquitted in impeachment proceedings, Bill Gates had just become the richest man in the world due to skyrocketing Microsoft stock, SpongeBob SquarePants debuted, and billions of cicadas buried themselves into the ground beneath the Northeastern United States. While no one will exactly be bringing the '90s back anytime soon, the 17-year cycle cicadas are about to reemerge for the first time into a totally different world.
As temperatures warm, billions of cicadas will begin to crawl out of the ground in Ohio, New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, and West Virginia, Fox News reports. The insects will complete their lifecycles after calling for, and finding, mates, then die after about a month or a month and a half. Three different species make up 2016's "Brood V."
When the cicadas eventually come out, the swarms are so big they create a racket and can be as dense as 1.5 million bugs per acre. But there is still some time yet to buy earplugs: Ground temperatures will need to hit 64 degrees before cicadas emerge to mate and lay their eggs. Then it will be another 17 years — 2033 — before the offspring come out again.
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