Maggots on a plane!!!

[Alanwsg]

From the BBC ....
https://news.sky.com/story/maggots-raining-on-plane-passengers-force-flight-to-make-u-turn-13071584

[ShyTorque]

They should have been on Fly B

[jimjim1]

Perhaps they were just small snakes?

https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/768x432/snakes_on_a_plane_aisle_768x432_213f715a3d2f26946f98c46dffb5 c00ceec7f80a.jpg

[AA_1A]

"Maggot Free Optional Upgrades Now Available for Select Class Members..."

[Peter Fanelli]

Ghana Airways planes used to arrive in the US with cargo containers infested with maggots because the passengers would carry fresh meat in their baggage
and Ghana Airways would often leave containers behind when they didn't have room. Was talking to an agriculture guy one night who told me that the maggots
are actually the delicacy and the fresh meat is there to feed them.

[TURIN]

From the BBC ....
https://news.sky.com/story/maggots-raining-on-plane-passengers-force-flight-to-make-u-turn-13071584
Sky is not BBC.

[AA_1A]

Ghana Airways .... talking to an agriculture guy one night who told me that the maggots are actually the delicacy and the fresh meat is there to feed them.Well that changes everything, and proves that one must know one's market and customers: "Meat Free Fresh Maggot Meal Optional Upgrades Now Also Available for Select Class Members On Certain Flights". Thanks Peter!

[tdracer]

Well that changes everything, and proves that one must know one's market and customers: "Meat Free Fresh Maggot Meal Optional Upgrades Now Also Available for Select Class Members On Certain Flights". Thanks Peter!
Not sure why you think it's the airline's fault when a brain-dead passenger brings a rotten fish on-board as their carry-on?

[Bksmithca]

I don't understand how the counter staff or th flight Attendants did smell the rotting fish and keep it off the aircraft

[Jhieminga]

Counter staff? They may have dropped off their luggage at a self-service drop-off point and not seen any counter staff until boarding. The security check would have looked at their carry-on bag, but at Schiphol the bag stays closed and is only scanned unless something fishy shows up on the screen. I guess rotting fish doesn't look suspicious to the security staff and does not warrant a hand search.

[S.o.S.]

Who gets to pay for cleaning the aircraft?

[jolihokistix]

In the early 1960s, flew back from Kenya to Heathrow, via Khartoum I seem to recall. I was with my nature-freak loving younger brother.
On the way into London, he started complaining about something he'd left on the plane. It was a small boiled-sweets tin, he said, and he'd left it in the overhead compartment. He wanted to go back to the airport and get it. Must have been something really precious, I thought.
"What was in it?" I asked.
"My live tick collection", he replied.

[netstruggler]

The security check would have looked at their carry-on bag, but at Schiphol the bag stays closed and is only scanned unless something fishy shows up on the screen. I guess rotting fish doesn't look suspicious to the security staff and does not warrant a hand search.

Rotting fish may not look suspicious but it would surely look fishy?

[Expatrick]

Rotting fish may not look suspicious but it would surely look fishy?

Especially when you put it on the scales!

[Expatrick]

In the early 1960s, flew back from Kenya to Heathrow, via Khartoum I seem to recall. I was with my nature-freak loving younger brother.
On the way into London, he started complaining about something he'd left on the plane. It was a small boiled-sweets tin, he said, and he'd left it in the overhead compartment. He wanted to go back to the airport and get it. Must have been something really precious, I thought.
"What was in it?" I asked.
"My live tick collection", he replied.

Similar to this (the Blandford fly) -

There are many legends which allege to account for its arrival, the most colourful being that a student from Bryanston School came back from a holiday in South America with one of the flies in a jam jar and left it in the science laboratory, where a cleaning lady knocked the jar onto the floor, breaking it and releasing the fly.

[Asturias56]

"with one of the flies in a jam jar " - TWO flies surely if they then bred locally??

[Expatrick]

"with one of the flies in a jam jar " - TWO flies surely if they then bred locally??

Not necessarily - hermaphrodite, or female with eggs already?

[Apron Artist]

During my time at Gatwick I had the pleasure (?) of managing the outbound baggage for the Med-View flight to Lagos. A complete horror story of a flight using a knackered 747-400 (TF-AMV) from Air Atlanta Icelandic. Every flight rammed - 20 AKEs (LD3s) and every bag 35+ kgs. Most over 40, record was 49kgs. And the bags absolutely stank and some were oozing what must have been frozen fish juice that was thawing. Disgusting, I'd get home from work and all uniform had to be washed at least twice to remove the last traces of smell. One particular night, for tech reasons 3 bins didn't make it onboard - so those bins were moved to the "Rush Unit" to be re-flighted for the next flight, 3 days later.

By the next night, there were maggots everywhere and the smell beyond anything I've smelled before or since. I was off for a few days after that, but I am led to believe that the 3 bins mysteriously vanished up to LHR for an earlier flight. Lucky them. So many more horror stories from the Med-View days...glad I didn't live in Charlwood.

[Lantern10]

Sounds like a job for a sniffer dog.

[Jhieminga]

Not sure... wouldn't that be seen as animal cruelty?

[IBMJunkman]

I watch the (now old) border control TV shows. NZ, AUS, USA, England. I am constantly amazed what people carry in their luggage.

I have returned home to the USA with bottles of wine, Cuban cigars (shhhh) and a few bespoke suits from England. I once was bringing home some computer tapes from Italy that were my employers. Had to explain those. But never fresh food.

[Krystal n chips]

During my time at Gatwick I had the pleasure (?) of managing the outbound baggage for the Med-View flight to Lagos. A complete horror story of a flight using a knackered 747-400 (TF-AMV) from Air Atlanta Icelandic. Every flight rammed - 20 AKEs (LD3s) and every bag 35+ kgs. Most over 40, record was 49kgs. And the bags absolutely stank and some were oozing what must have been frozen fish juice that was thawing. Disgusting, I'd get home from work and all uniform had to be washed at least twice to remove the last traces of smell. One particular night, for tech reasons 3 bins didn't make it onboard - so those bins were moved to the "Rush Unit" to be re-flighted for the next flight, 3 days later.

By the next night, there were maggots everywhere and the smell beyond anything I've smelled before or since. I was off for a few days after that, but I am led to believe that the 3 bins mysteriously vanished up to LHR for an earlier flight. Lucky them. So many more horror stories from the Med-View days...glad I didn't live in Charlwood.

Unfortunate though that may have been, please remember the poor sods, the cleaners, who had to remove the maggots and the engineers involved in any subsequent inspections. An acknowledgement for their efforts would have been nice.

[PAXboy]

When my nephew was RHS in Southern Africa, he served his time hopping small locations in small twin turbo-props. Luggage had to be carefully checked - whether carried or loaded. They found:

Motorcar engine, still with oil in the sump to be 'hand carried' into the cabin.
Tins of petrol for the engine - naturally.
Food of ALL and ANY type.
Staff adding a suitcase to go to their friend at the destination. This was unchecked and just loaded on without a tag. Then they would phone their mate working airside at destination to say it was on board.
As with most destinations in that great continent, the concept of 'max weight' is not fully understood.
The loaders might see that there is spare 'space' in the hold and fill it up. If that took them overweight or out of CofG...?

Amongst many more.

[tdracer]

Don't forget this one that exploded in flames on landing in Tawain:
Uni Air Flight 873 - Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uni_Air_Flight_873)

Apparently, there were two brain dead passengers - one brought bottles of gasoline in their on-board luggage (that leaked), and another had a motorcycle battery (that shorted).
Although one passenger died and the aircraft was destroyed, they were damn lucky it happened on landing and not in the air...