"Bees stop play" is not an announcement usually heard by tennis players, but Carlos Alcaraz made a beeline for the exit after thousands of the insects swarmed centre court at Indian Wells.
The Spaniard was about to serve at 1-1 in the first set of his quarterfinal against Alexander Zverev on Thursday when the pesky insects started circling around the court.
After making futile attempts to swat away the bees with his racket, Alcaraz ran for cover into the locker room.
Bemused umpire Mohamed Lahyani informed the crowd "we are having problems with bees" before confirming that play could not continue as the insects had taken over the court.
Thousands of bees could also be seen under one of the aerial cameras over the main court at Indian Wells Tennis Garden, while others smacked into the lenses of the TV cameras.
Zverev did not play badly but Alcaraz's all-court game was just too good, the 20-year-old world No 2 sealing the victory by breaking the German for the fourth time and taking his winning streak in the Californian desert to 10 matches.
"It was strange, I've never seen something like that at a tennis match," twice major champion Alcaraz said of the invasion of the bees.
"I'm not going to lie, I'm a little bit afraid of the bees. Once the match started again, I managed to stay away from the bees and do the things I needed to do."
Earlier, Italian Jannik Sinner continued his perfect start to the season, cruising past Jiri Lehecka 6-3 6-3 to improve his win-loss record this year to 16-0.
A windy, cool day did little to slow down the hottest player on the men's tour as Sinner was in control throughout, facing a single break chance the entire contest while his opponent piled up unforced errors.
"In the morning, it was really, really windy," Sinner said in his court-side interview. "The first set was tough to handle.
"He has huge potential so I was really aware of every point that I made and in a way I am just happy because I make the semi-finals last year and this year I have again a chance to play in the semis in one of the greatest tournaments we have throughout the whole year."
He will face Alcaraz in the semifinals.
Lehecka reached his first Masters 1000 quarterfinal with upset wins over fifth seed Andrey Rublev and 11th seed Stefanos Tsitsipas but had no answers for the lanky Australian Open champion.
The third seed quickly had his Czech opponent under pressure by collecting the first break in the third game with a massive forehand winner before closing out the set with a second break.
It was much the same business-like approach in the second as Sinner again claimed the early break to get 3-1 ahead and he held serve on the way to a 19th straight win including three from the end of last season.
Local hope Tommy Paul also reached the semi-finals with a 6-2 1-6 6-3 win over Casper Ruud. He will play the winner of the remaining quarterfinal between Daniil Medvedev and Holger Rune.
