Snakes on a plane killed

[herptrader]

http://www.theage.com.au/travel/snakes-on-a-plane-killed-20090415-a7h7.html

Bridie Smith

April 16, 2009

FOUR escaped pythons have caused a Qantas plane to be grounded in Melbourne after airline staff failed to find them.

The young Stimson's pythons, four of 12 in a container in the Boeing 737-800's cargo hold, apparently escaped on Tuesday during a 2½-hour flight from Alice Springs to Melbourne.

[...]

This has the potential to shut down the air freighting of reptiles and is mega bad. As air freighting is the main way of shipping reptiles it could basically stop interstate shipments.


Note: I tried to post this to the reptile news forum but there seems to be some gremlins behind the scenes this morning.

 

[Earthling]

I agree it has the 'potential' but not by much.
Notice how they said:
"...and were travelling in "an appropriate" container. He said it was not clear how the four had escaped.
"While (the container) was intact on departure (from Alice Springs), it was discovered on arrival that four of those animals had broken free,""

The container may have been damaged by inappropriate luggage handling or some other cause Qantas's end, not necesarily the senders fault. As no blame was made towards the sender and in cases like this, one would have thought if the sender was to blame it would have been stated.

Dont panic.

 

[herpkeeper]

always the way, one bad apple spoils the whole barrel
trying to save a few $$$ no doubt
too expensive to buy a crush proof plastic container ($5-$10)
drill some holes in it & bag the snakes and put them in it,
inside a 6 pack eski with a few holes in it...........

the reason i say this, is because i have had some animals sent to me ( a few years back)
that where less than adequately packed & one was loose when i opened the package

 

[Jewly]

In no way can that be blamed on the sender. Staff at AAE have a duty to only accept animals in suitable containers and they even state on their website the minimum requirements of suitable containers. Plus, all snakes must be first put in snake bags and goosenecked.

Such a shame that 4 little snakes had to die because humans can't be bothered doing their job right.

 

[Tojo]

Makes me wonder if the stimos were packed properly so not to be able to escape. If in some sort of bag appropriately closed then put inside a crush proof container how did the little fellas get out of the bag?I agree with jewly that it does sit in AAE hands for accepting the container!

 

[Reptilian66]

All Reptile's should only be freigted in plastic containers, you can get in different size's in most leading Supermarkets or Bunnings stores, or made from plywood timber with a few holes drilled into them for ventilation.
l wonder who the sender was from Alice Springs, l know most of thoses that keep Reptile's from Alice Springs NT, and have some idear who it could be that freighted the Stimson Python's, its sad 4 lost their life because they may not have been bag properly before being freighted

 

[TahneeMaree]

:evil: Did they HAVETO GAS them though!? Seriously, they'd haveto find them no mater if they were dead or alive, they were 15cm long the poor things, anyone could have caught them given that they would be prepared for a few paper cuts.

Seriously, would they gas a cat or dog that had escaped? They'd do more damage to someone trying to catch them, these were someones pets and they just killed them because they couldn't be bothered catching them, even when it's probably the companies fault that they got out! I hope there's some definate compo going towards the person who was to recieve the poor snakes.

 

[slim6y]

:evil: Did they HAVETO GAS them though!? Seriously, they'd haveto find them no mater if they were dead or alive, they were 15cm long the poor things, anyone could have caught them given that they would be prepared for a few paper cuts.

It's all about perspective really - Unfortunately the cost of grounding a 737 is just a little more than the life of four snakes. That one grounding would have cost Qantas thousands of dollars (probably at least tens of thousands). So gassing and guaranteed death is better than costing a struggling airline even more money!

Dead... they might smell for a bit... but unlikely.

Alive... the stigma of snakes on a plane would certainly put off many travellers wanting to fly the friendly skies.

 

[Lozza]

Alive... the stigma of snakes on a plane would certainly put off many travellers wanting to fly the friendly skies.

They would probably have also been worried about them getting into wiring etc and possibly damaging something - they haven't had a good run with safety of late so the last thing they need is a crashed plane because a few wires came loose from snakes slithering around.

We have already had a Qantaslink ban on reptiles before - we don't need that again.

 

[Veredus]

Seeing as AAE likely would not allow the snakes on board the plane unless properly packaged, is it conceivable that an AAE employee stole the snakes from their packaging, as the news article stated that someone simply noticed four were missing and not that anybody actually saw snakes.

 

[herptrader]

Suggest that further comment on this thread should actually be made here:

http://www.aussiepythons.com/forum/reptile-news/four-snakes-ground-qantas-plane-108476

 

[Earthling]

:evil: Did they HAVETO GAS them though!? Seriously, they'd haveto find them no mater if they were dead or alive, they were 15cm long the poor things, anyone could have caught them given that they would be prepared for a few paper cuts.

Seriously, would they gas a cat or dog that had escaped? They'd do more damage to someone trying to catch them, these were someones pets and they just killed them because they couldn't be bothered catching them, even when it's probably the companies fault that they got out! I hope there's some definate compo going towards the person who was to recieve the poor snakes.

Imgaine all the little nooks and crannies and pipes that those little guys could fit into in a plane....you would have to literally take the plane apart to find them.

Suggest that further comment on this thread should actually be made here:

http://www.aussiepythons.com/forum/reptile-news/four-snakes-ground-qantas-plane-108476

Link not working....

 

[Wild~Touch]

Suggest that further comment on this thread should actually be made here:

http://www.aussiepythons.com/forum/reptile-news/four-snakes-ground-qantas-plane-108476

My immediate thoughts too ....that the packaging had been tampered with... ????

 

[herptrader]

Yeah, I put the right link in but APS morphs it into something that does not work.

The site seems to be under going a number of changes at the moment.

It is one of the recent posts in the Reptile News Forum (which I also could not post to for similar reasons.)

Imgaine all the little nooks and crannies and pipes that those little guys could fit into in a plane....you would have to literally take the plane apart to find them.



Link not working....