Carlos Alcaraz caught in the middle of bee swarm at Indian Wells: All you need to know about the unexpected incident in Spaniard's QF clash

Carlos Alcaraz booked a semifinal spot at the 2024 Indian Wells Masters with a 6-3, 6-1 victory over Alexander Zverev in the quarterfinals.

The quarterfinal clash was unusually interrupted when a swarm of bees attacked the stadium barely nine minutes into play. Alcaraz himself was attacked and he had to run to take cover.

Let's look at the sequence of events that followed the unique incident.

Swarm of bees delay play

Both players had won a game each of the opening set when Alcaraz prepared to serve at 15-0 in the third game.

The Spaniard initially squatted off a few bees before looking up and realizing the full extent of the swarm attack. He first went to the chair umpire Mohamed Lahyani who was battling the situation himself. Lahyani immidiately called for the match to be suspended.

"Play cannot continue. We will pause for a while here now," chair umpire Lahyani announced.

Concerned for his peer, Zverve called Carlos Alcaraz to his side of the net where there were fewer bees. Before Alcaraz could react, he was engulfed by the swarm, visibly panicked. He swung his raquet around in defense before running for shleter inside the stadium.

Professional beekeepers called for safety

The match remained suspended for one hour and 48 minutes. During that time, a portion if the stadium was evacutaed for safety. The organizers called for professional beekepers to vaccuum out the bees that were strangely densed around a bird-eye cam.

Carlos Alcaraz later took to social media to express his appreciation and applauded the beekeepers' efforts.

"Not all heroes wear capes!" wrote Alcaraz on X(formerly Twitter) with wave and applause emojis.

The players stepped back on-court for a few warm-ups to assess the situation. They stopped a few times before being fully confident that the bees were not causing any distraction.

With the situation under control, play resumed and the World No. 2 brought his laser focus back to the task at hand. He stonewalled the German to close the match 6-3, 6-1 in his favor.

Carlos Alcaraz's take on the unusual experience

The 20-year-old later made light of the situation despite being stung on the forehead. He described it as one of the "most unusual" matches of his career.

"For sure the most unusual match I have ever played in my career. I've never experienced something like that. I've never seen something like that," said Alcaraz in a post-match press conference

"So I think I will remember that match because of that. I think everybody will remember this situation, and we found it as a funny thing. That's for sure," he added.

Carlos Alcaraz described his experience and admitted to being "a little bit afraid" of bees.

"I saw some bees around, but I thought it was just a few of them, just not too many. But I saw the sky and there was thousands, thousands flying, stuck in my hair, going to me. It was crazy. One of them was hitting on me."

"But yeah, I tried to stay away from them, but it was impossible. As I said, stuck in my hair, so I was running out. I'm a little bit afraid of them [smiling]."

Carlos Alcaraz will next play Jannik Sinner in the semifinals of Indian Wells Masters on Saturday, March 16.