A TikTok video of what looks like a flying saucer (or a movie stunt) over Tempe goes viral

As the cloud hung in the sky over Tempe, it looked for all the world like it wasn't from this one.

It was shaped like a flying saucer, a dark gray gash in the sky that struck a stark contrast with the puffy white cloud rising up behind it.

A video of the strange phenomenon, shot out of a car window along Tempe's Priest Drive, was posted online three days ago by TikTok user @neshahiggins.

"What is that?" someone in the car can be heard wondering aloud, the video zooming in on the potentially extraterrestrial oval as an unconcerned airplane passes by.

It turned out many had the same question. The video quickly gathered steam online, picking up millions of views across TikTok and Twitter, and thousands of comments, too.

Some of them welcomed our new alien overlords. "I would’ve stood under it bc I’m done with this planet rn 😂😂" read a comment that garnered nearly 25,000 likes.

Another person appreciated the video's modern quality, writing: "Finally one that wasn't filmed on a camera from the 70s."

Others were less willing to play along.

"It's a cloud lol," one wrote.

Even Jordan Peele, the brain behind horror hits "Get Out" and "Us," weighed in.

There's plenty of looking to the sky in the trailer for Peele's upcoming film "Nope."

But when a Twitter user tagged him in the viral video and joked that Peele's marketing is "always top tier," the director replied: "That one's not mine."

So if it's not a UFO, and it's not an elaborate bid to get people to the cinema ... what is it?

Marvin Percha, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Phoenix, thinks he has the answer.

“It’s hard to tell, but I think what it is is what we call a lenticular cloud," he told The Arizona Republic.

These stationary clouds usually form over mountains, where the terrain can cause moving air to rise up in waves, or in response to windshear, when wind changes direction or speed in a particular area.

The wind changes can cause a “localized lift," Percha said. "If the humidity in the atmosphere is close to 100%, that little bit of lift can result in a cloud that remains stationary.”

"The cloud tends to be flattened as opposed to a towering cloud."

Because of how they form, lenticular clouds are usually found in mountainous regions, not valleys like metro Phoenix.

"They’re certainly seen fairly often over the San Francisco Peaks, or the Rocky Mountains," Percha said. "If you go to Denver you might see them over the Rockies."

"But they can occasionally occur in other situations if you have an unstable layer in the atmosphere."

“It’s not really unusual," he added.

So there's no reason to worry.

There might have been, though, for nervous flyers traveling in or out of Phoenix on the day the cloud appeared.

"When you see these kinds of clouds it's usually a concern for turbulence," Percha said.

“They had probably had some bumpy rides coming in and out of Sky Harbor."

Reach the reporter at lane.sainty@arizonarepublic.com. Follow her on Twitter @lanesainty.

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Strange cloud over Tempe goes viral, catches attention of Jordan Peele