PHOTOS: 9 rare waterspouts appear on Qinghai Lake

A rare and spectacular scene occurred over Qinghai Lake on Monday as a total of nine waterspouts were spotted over the lake's waters, all in just over half an hour.

Waterspouts, known much more cooly in Chinese as “dragon sucking water,” are a meteorological phenomenon that causes funnel-shaped clouds to form above a body of water. The funnels form when winds rush faster and faster and swirl into an upward vortex  — much the same as a tornado, but damper.

With a total surface area of 4,317 square kilometers, Qinghai Lake is the largest lake in China and the seventh-largest saltwater lake in the world.