What interesting cargo have YOU turned away?

[Captain Nomad]

Weighing up a load of passengers (locals) and cargo away from base today, my suspicions were aroused when one very small backpack weighed 15kg... Thinking maybe the bloke was trying to take bullets out to an area that has been known to have gun problems, I asked what was in his bag. Fortunately he came out with a straight, honest answer MERCURY! What the?!! No way hosea - not on my aeroplane you won't! I was assured it was sealed well and subsequently I was shown that the thermos sized cylinder had been covered in newspaper taped with electrical tape but somehow that didn't quite change my mind... :} Of course he was obviously wanting to start his own gold mine or something. After discovering he couldn't take his prize cargo he decided not to travel.

Anyone else care to add their interesting stories of offloaded contraband?!

[FRQ Charlie Bravo]

I've had some crazy would-be cargo but no heavy metals secured by electrical tape.:ugh:

Bravo:D

[Peter Fanelli]

At one time when I was doing customer service for a US airline I had to remove a passenger who's bag was found to be full of explosives. Seems he was a salesman of such stuff and was on his way to a trade display somewhere and frequently travelled with the stuff.

[STUBBIES]

Had a 4 foot Croc once.In the pax defence,it was on a leash.

[Flight Me]

Friggin Goannas, frozen of course.:eek:

[Ang737]

Horse Semen during the Equine Flu crisis. :cool:

[ForkTailedDrKiller]

A suitcase full of the finest "herb" that Northland has to offer!

Should have turned it away - but I didn't. Flew its somewhat dubious looking owner from Palmerston North to Kaitia to collect it. It never occurred to me what might have been in it until the owner paid for the charter from a roll of 20's.

Dr :8

[Razor]

pumpkins - loose. couldn't store them anywhere so had to say no. Because.....heard of an aircraft at Daru, PNG that once took off with a pile of loose coconuts down the back. Interesting CofG problem after rotate when they all rolled towards the rear!

[Buster Hyman]

25,000kg piece of machinery that had been flown in from Europe. MDL couldn't get it off the aircraft at Tulla & had to divert flight to SYD from memory. Only alternative was AKL & ship it back. Some boffin at HQ didn't look up what our equipment could handle...I think it was CR2.:=

[VH-XXX]

I would have been more worried (for your personal safety) if it was a roll of 100's.

Abalone springs to mind and no doubt many of you will have also been asked.

On the flip side, I was asked to leave the aircraft (before it took off) because I had live ammunition and 40 cal pistol in my bag. They somehow to my absolute amazement made it through screening when I inadvertantly took the wrong bag on board. They didn't make the same mistake again the next day when I checked in again. (It was totally unrelated that they found out they were in my bag once I had actually boarded)

[aileron_69]

I've carted a few Live turtles around from (of course) the communities. Had a toolbox one day that was so big it had to be loaded into the plane with a forklift...of course upon reaching the mine noone had told the guys how heavy it was and they thought they were going to lift it out!! yeah right!! After they heaved and strained for about 10 mins with the toolbox going nowhere I suggested perhaps they might want to take some of the contents out then try moving it...which seemed to work a lot better!!

[bushy]

I once took some outback station people to an interstate wedding and had to come back empty to bring a second load. When these people charterd an aeroplane they did not let it fly empty so I ended up with a load which included a cage of galahs. On of them was very vocal, and there were some strange radio calls from that aircraft.

[tinpis]

Once in THE LAND OF THE UNEXPECTED a passengers suitcase containing a chopped up body of his departed mate
He had got a quote to freight him home the day before but thought this was much cheaper idea.:hmm:
The tomato sauce leaking out the case was a give away tho.

[Metro man]

5 litre glass bottle of acid being carried in a plastic shopping bag. Passenger was a doctor and should have known better.

[Clown Act]

dead roo and dead turtle.

[Counter-rotation]

Thought when I saw this thread, that I had a good answer. But I've been trumped by Tinpis and (to a lesser extent) Clown Act. And probably others that haven't posted here yet.
I was taking some locals from Mornington Island back to another nearby community, and was surprised at the weight of some of the bags they had. Then I noticed them leaking fluid which, errr, STANK!
The contents - Dugong meat.
:yuk:
CR.

[ForkTailedDrKiller]

There is NOTHING! I repeat NO THING (!) that stinks quite like a dead dugong !!!!!!!!!!

Dr :cool:

[Windy Chester]

Was taking a load of metre long crocs from Kikora to Nadzab one day when I saw one which hadnt been sedated properly, trying to escape. Watched him crawl up and down under the cargo net for 30 min, just hopeing it wouldnt come up front even though it had its jaws bound up.

[Hottie]

During early aviation days, charter to FINKE from ALICE in a PA32-300 Cherokee Six, VH-ICC.
Passenger was testing (willing) his ballistic theory by trying to load a 4ft (3/4 full) Oxygen Cylinder...
Vne ONLY 192 Kts...not 300+ :}

Some just never cease to amaze me......:\

[tinpis]

There is NOTHING! I repeat NO THING (!) that stinks quite like a dead dugong !!!!!!!!!!

Some of our Longrassers would come close Dr . http://www.augk18.dsl.pipex.com/Smileys/poop.gif

[Howard Hughes]

Some of them certainly smell like they are dead tin!!:eek:

[Tmbstory]

tinpis

I thought durian took a lot of beating!


Tmb

[Buster Hyman]

Oh, front quarter panel for a HZ Kingswood..."But, it's my baggage Bro'"

[VH-XXX]

I concur. If you haven't smelt Durian, you haven't lived. That stuff wreaks. It's the national fruit of Malaysia from memory. It also caused the grounding of a departing Virgin aircraft a couple of years back when the passenger tried to hide the smell with a white powder.

In the home country of this national fruit, it's actually illegal to take it aboard public transport because it smells so bad. It's actually supposed to be an aphrodisiac.

[Reverseflowkeroburna]

Had the lockers stuffed with bags of Cape Barren Geese that had been shot at the annual shoot. Had to knock some back cos of the ole "sauce" leakage problem!

[tipsy2]

I didn't turn him away but he (in a body bag) sat up as we climbed to 10000 enroute Ceduna/Adelaide on a warm January day.

tipsy
And I can still hear the 'noises' he made.

[Horatio Leafblower]

A 1.5m croc rolled up in a Doona

700kg of frozen Turkey meat in a Chieftain- "Can we just put it in tubs with Dry ice?" :rolleyes: - from Cessnock to PERTH!

2 Blokes, Mr Smith and Mr Jones, for a 4-day charter:
"Just take us about 4 hours away from Perth, we will drive from there. Wait in the motel until we call you. Be ready to go."

...again, a Chieftain from Bankstown (no, we don't want to go from Sydney) 12 hours to ------- . And they paid the $15,000 in cash. :uhoh:

[Rich Pitch Power]

In a previous life flying food aid in Africa we had a particular hole of a destination that was always hot with a really short 'runway' and when it rained turned to a quicksand type of mud that would ground the aircraft for about 3 days. This hell hole always produced a late item or two of cargo in hessian sacks (unmanifested of course) when we wanted to take off and the thunderstorms were almost upon us. They clinked a lot and when I asked what was in there after take off (this being my first trip to paradise of course) I was informed it was Ouzo, lots of it.

I thought about this on the 2 1/2 hour leg home and bailed the captain up about it later in the evening. I did not mind carrying the cargo at all, Ouzo was the only drink you could get in this part of the world if you were lucky but I did think it posed a hell of a fire risk in the cabin even though we were a freighter operation.

Eventually since we could not really say no to the carriage of the stuff we threatened to offload it all each and every time unless the crew were given two bottles every time a run was made.

The ouzo had the last laugh though, the very next time we carried the stuff we almost got done by a rather large electrical storm and required the entire 2 bottles over the following two nights to calm the nerves and get us back into a flying state whilst the engineers checked the aircraft thoroughly for damage from the awful flight...

RPP

[Capt Wally]

Was tasked one night to fly a consignment of frozen fish (salmon I think it was ) out to Fiji from ML. Talk about having to gut the plane, put plastic down everywhere & keep the cabin not above 4 deg's C !!!. That meant we too had to be exposed to that lovely temp !!! & for around 4 hrs !!!:bored:.............talk about yr 'cold soak' ! Try flying with 2 pairs of socks, blankets over you as tho you where oldies in a retirement home !

On the return journey (M/T obviously) had the cabin roasting....ahhhhh toasty !:E

Had the Soggies one night also, talk about hut hut hut hut !, can almost classify them as breathing dangerous cargo ! Great bunch of chaps tho, dangerously fit they where & obliging to show me there nasty weapons for 'breaches' !:).


CW:)

[RadioSaigon]

hmmm ok, let's see...


Dead bodies, several, once a similar experience to a previous poster,
Paua (Abalone to the uninitiated) legally caught, in tubs -sort of a slurpy, sucky sound behind me all the way. Was going to souvenir one for dinner, grabbed a beaut at the top of the tub & all his mates wanted to come too...
Crayfish, frozen tails in bags, fresh in bags, shorties in a secret spot :) ... mmmm freshly cooked legs for breakfast, sitting on the wing watching the boys load the floatie. Chhhhoooooiiiiiiicccce
Bread delivery (also in the floatie) to a boat at sea
Salmon tubs (boring) night run
one bloke who wanted to take a cooked pig... didn't
another bloke wanted to take enough fresh meat to feed the whole whanau for a month... didn'tThat's about all I can think of for the minute.

[the wizard of auz]

I started my flying career doing some runs on the south coast carting Abalone.
Thing to watch is the fisherman will show you a docket that states the weight...... Of the Abalone only........now each tub was around 25KG of abalone.....It said so on the docket. but they neglect to weigh the 25KG of water the tubs hold as well. I made some pretty ordinary landings and they generally required tons of power to keep them rolling. a few scary take offs and gear retractions way out at sea, as I was to scared to turn the aircraft after take off with the stall warning blaring. took simple me three flights to work out why the plane flew like a bucket and rectified it next flight by only loading half the tubs. :ugh: