mayfly or dipteran with strange (mating?) behavior

fogsna Seattle, WA Jul 23, 2011

Hi all, unfortunately I don't have a picture of this one. I was hiking back down in Rainier national park in Washington, trying to get off the trail before a nasty looking storm hit, so I was in a bit of a hurry. In the forest I came across these swarms of small mosquito-sized insects. They weren't exactly swarming, but they were flying up and down in the sunlight, their bodies oriented vertically, with head pointed to the sky and abdomen towards the ground. they had very little color, mostly white. they also had 3 fairly long cerci from the end of the abdomen. this made me think mayfly, though they looked more like dipterans. unfortunately, i didn't get a good look at the wings. their behavior was so odd though, i think it should be an identifying characteristic.

to be more clear, each insect would fly vertically upwards for 1-2 feet, then drop (free-fall) back down before suddenly reversing their direction and flying straight up again. over and over again. there were maybe 20-30 insects in each of these 'swarms', and i could see them throughout the woods.

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