Spanish police said Tuesday they found five snakes, two lizards and thousands of insects alive and hidden inside two suitcases that arrived on the holiday island of Gran Canaria on a flight from Madrid.
Lying on a massage table at a spa in the Indonesian capital Jakarta, Feri Tilukay closed his eyes and smiled blissfully as three enormous snakes slithered all over him.
A tiny snake as slender as a pen forced the grounding of a Japan-bound Qantas flight in the Australian city of Sydney overnight, stranding hundreds of passengers.
As Hong Kong prepares to usher in the Year of the Snake, an increasing number of the reptiles are slithering their way into local households, with sales of the uncuddly pet rocketing.
It was not quite a "Snakes on a Plane" scenario, but passengers on a Qantas jet watched in amazement as a three-metre (nine feet) python clung to the outside of their aircraft during a flight.