Military members and emergency workers from around the world have been laying down on the ground with their equipment, weapons and vehicles and then posting aerial photos on social media in a bizarre new meme called the “Tetris Challenge.”
The trend caught on this month after first responders in Switzerland organized traffic cones, fire extinguishers, other equipment and their bodies in a photo with the hashtag #tetrischallenge.
Several other outfits — including Finnish police, Hungarian soldiers, Royal Malaysian Navy and the Dutch army then joined in — laying out arms, uniforms and drones alongside planes, helicopters and even tanks.
Although the name of the meme suggests the classic block-arranging video game, the photos also look like lifesized toy or Lego sets.
That also seems to be the impression of the airmen at the Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota, who laid down and surrounded themselves with their radios, nigh-vision goggles, rifles and machine guns with the caption: “Limited edition! Order now for $1,245,000.00!”
Despite the recent spike in attention, the challenge can be traced back to November 2018, when New Zealand Police tweeted out a photo of a cop and his equipment with the hashtag “#Flatlay.”