Passengers on the plane spotted the three metre long snake clinging to the aircraft’s wing and watched it trying to huddle against the freezing air temperatures and biting winds it was exposed to at the plane’s high altitude.
At no point was the snake inside of the plane’s cabin and the snake was alone in its endeavours. So in many ways the situation was nothing like Snakes on a Plane at all, which isn’t a bad thing.
The snake is believed to have boarded through the landing bay before climbing into the aircraft’s trailing ledge flap assembly.
“The people at the front were oblivious to what was going on,” said passenger Robert Weber. “But the passengers at the back were all totally focused on the snake and how it might have got onto the aircraft.”
“There was no panic. At no time did anyone stop to consider that there might be others on board.”
Unfortunately the intrepid scrub python didn’t survive the journey to Port Moresby, but why did it try in the first place?
As anyone with even the most basic interest in Herpetology could tell you the scrub python or morelia amethistina is commonly found right across the north of Australia as well as throughout Indonesia and Papua New Guinea… Maybe this one was going to visit some relatives in PNG, or just getting away from it all and trying to take a holiday?
Either way this death is a terrible tragedy. No wonder Qantas didn’t make it onto the Jet Airliner Crash Data Evaluation Centre’s (JACDEC) recent top 10 safest airline list.
There’s blood on your hands Qantas!
