Snake on a Plane: Stowaway Serpent Grounds Qantas Flight in Sydney

Passengers who had been hoping to travel from Sydney to Tokyo found themselves stranded when their flight became Samuel L. Jackson's worst nightmare; there was a snake on the plane, according to the BBC.

The crew of a Qantas flight found an eight inch long Mandarin rat snake in the cabin shortly before passengers were to board the plane. Mandarin rat snakes are non-venomous and pose no threat to humans but the plane was still fumigated in order to make sure that there weren't any more snakes lurking on board, according to the BBC.

"The snake has gone into quarantine to determine where it's come from," a spokeswoman for Qantas told the Australian.

The 370 passengers who were planning to head to Tokyo Sunday night found themselves being put up in hotels for one more night in Australia, a flight was rescheduled for Monday morning, according to the Australian.

The snake, which is commonly found in Asia but is not indigenous to Australia, was killed so as to make sure that it wouldn't introduce any non-native pests or diseases in to the country. Since Australia has such a unique ecosystem they have to be very careful about what animals come into the country, according to the BBC.

This was not the first time that a Qantas flight has found a serpent stowaway on board. After a flight between Cairns, Australia and Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea the crew found that a scrub python had tried to hitch a ride on one of the wings of the aircraft. Unfortunately for the snake it did not survive the trip, the BBC reports.

A snake is far from the strangest thing to ever be found on an airplane. The travel website Skyscanner took a survey of airline crewmembers to find out some of the oddest things that weary travelers have left behind. They included handcuffs, a live parrot, a glass eye, a box of dried fish and a prosthetic leg.

Of course, there was one item that came up in the survey that would have helped solve the problem in Sydney; a live falcon that would have surely enjoyed a meal of Mandarin rat snake.