Last updated: 8:45 AM ET, Wed July 2, 2025
Snakes on a plane might be the main idea behind the iconic movie of the same name, but passengers on a Virgin Australia flight experienced it in reality this week.
On Tuesday, Virgin Australia Flight VA337 was headed to Brisbane from Melbourne Airport when the flight faced a two-hour delay prior to takeoff after a snake was found in the aircraft’s cargo hold.
According to the Associated Press, snake catcher Mark Pelley arrived on the scene and, believing it was a dangerous species, caught the snake as it was hiding behind a panel in the cargo hold.
“I said to them if I don’t get this in one shot, it’s going to sneak through the panels and you’re going to have to evacuate the plane because at that stage I did not know what kind of snake it was,” Pelley told AP News. “But thankfully, I got it on the first try and captured it. If I didn’t get it that first time, the engineers and I would be pulling apart a (Boeing) 737 looking for a snake still right now.”
After he successfully caught the snake, he identified it as a harmless two-footlong green tree snake. They’re native to the region, and according to Queensland’s Department of the Environment, Tourism, Science and Innovation, they typically hunt and sleep in trees, and are one of the most common snakes in Australia.
Pelley believes it stowed away onboard in someone’s luggage, then found its way out of the luggage sometime during the previous flight. The snake cannot be returned to the wild, so it was given to a local veterinarian who will find it a home with someone who is a licensed snake keeper.
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