Recently during a heavy rain in Bangor, Maine, citizens outside of a Shaw's grocery store saw several eels swimming in the parking lot.

The store is across from the Penobscot River.

One man, Chris Pushor, took a photo and shared it on Facebook with the caption, "I understand it's raining hard but eels swimming in Shaw's parking lot interesting," according to an article in the Bangor Daily News (BDN).

In an interview with BDN, Pushor said, "There were about ten in the parking area, some were still alive and others had been hit by cars. The big one was about two feet long, it was just a surprise to see them."

The newspaper reported that the Shaw's Supermarket on Main Street said that the eels were in the parking lot and that store employees returned the eels to the river.

The Maine Department of Marine Resources reports here on the comings and goings of eels in that state. The secret of the American eel's migration from rivers along the Atlantic Coast to the North Atlantic was recently reported by a study. 

In some areas, scientists truck eels to locations above hydroelectric dams to aid them in their migration patterns, as the Chesapeake Bay's Bay Journal newspaper reported here.

American Eels were also recently kept off the federal Endangered Species List again. Many coastal and slightly inland locations have eel monitoring programs. For instance, New York state reported its Hudson River Eel Report here, from 2008-2015. 

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-Follow Catherine on Twitter @TreesWhales