An Australian domestic flight was delayed for two hours after a stowaway snake was found in the plane’s cargo hold, officials said on Wednesday.
A snake was discovered on Tuesday while passengers were boarding Virgin Australia Flight VA337 at Melbourne Airport, set to depart for Brisbane, as reported by snake catcher Mark Pelley.
The snake turned out to be a harmless 2-foot green tree snake.
But Pelly said he thought it could be venomous when he approached it in the darkened hold.
“It wasn’t until after I caught the snake that I realized that it wasn’t venomous. Until that point, it looked very dangerous to me,” Pelley said.
Most of the world’s most venomous snakes are native to Australia.
When Pelley entered the cargo hold, the snake was half hidden behind a panel and could have disappeared deeper into the plane.
Pelley said he told an aircraft engineer and airline staff that they would have to evacuate the aircraft if the snake disappeared inside the plane.
“I informed them that if I didn’t catch it in one go, it would slip through the panels, necessitating an evacuation of the plane because I wasn’t yet sure of the snake’s species,” Pelley explained.
“Fortunately, I managed to catch it on my initial attempt,” Pelley continued. “Had I missed, the engineers and I would currently be dismantling a Boeing 737 searching for the snake.”
Pelley said he had taken 30 minutes to drive to the airport and was then delayed by security before he could reach the airliner.
An airline official said the flight was delayed around two hours.
Because the snake is native to the Brisbane region, Pelley suspects it came aboard inside a passenger’s luggage and escaped during the two-hour flight from Brisbane to Melbourne.
For quarantine reasons, the snake can’t be returned to the wild.
The snake, which is a protected species, has been given to a Melbourne veterinarian to find a home with a licensed snake keeper.
