A routine bag check at Ontario International Airport turned tense last month when TSA officers spotted something moving inside a passenger's checked luggage: two live snakes, concealed in a pillowcase. The discovery, caught on TSA video, prompted officers to pause screening operations in the immediate area while airport police took control of the bag.
According to CBS News, TSA officers discovered the snakes during a routine bag inspection, and X-ray images of the bag initially showed what appeared to be a rope. That rope turned out to be two live snakes concealed in a pillowcase. TSA officer Benjamin Andrade-Carillo said he immediately escalated the discovery once he realized the item in his hand was alive, and he quickly notified a supervisor.
Fellow officer Suggey Flores, a supervisory TSA officer, said he felt the pillowcase tense up and start moving. He added that he was not too spooked by the find because he had held snakes before, though he noted the snakes could have been venomous.
Screening Paused as Police Took the Bag
With safety concerns rising, TSA paused screening operations in the immediate area, the report states. Airport police then took possession of the bag and brought it to the airline ticketing area, where the passenger removed the snakes himself. He handed the animals off to a non-traveling family member rather than take them through security again.
Once the snakes were out of the bag, TSA rescreened the luggage, and the passenger was cleared to continue on his trip. Per the Los Angeles TSA Coordination Center's account relayed by CBS News, the passenger said the snakes were his pets and that he had previously traveled with them on another airline, though details of that airline's rules were not specified.
A Career-First for One TSA Officer
Andrade-Carillo said he had not found anything like this in his two years on the job, even after encountering plenty of odd items at checkpoints. He recalled one previous incident in San Diego in which a man tried to bring live lobsters through security as a carry-on.
The Ontario find is far from the only time TSA officers have come across live animals tucked into luggage. The agency has also highlighted a 2024 case at Miami International Airport in which snakes were hidden in a passenger's pants, as reported by creators.yahoo.com. The same report notes that turtles were found hidden in a passenger's bra at that airport in 2025, and a turtle was discovered hidden in a passenger's pants at Newark Liberty International Airport that same year.
Snakes Keep Turning Up in Unlikely Places
Smuggled reptiles have shown up in stranger spots than clothing, too. The Cool Down reports that in one separate screening, officers checking a bag found a live snake tucked inside a computer. A related case detailed by travel-news.co.uk described TSA officers at an unnamed U.S. airport finding a live boa constrictor concealed inside a hollowed-out CPU hard drive, alongside a knife hidden within a laptop during that same screening session. The outlet also reported that TSA posted in 2024 about a four-foot boa constrictor found in a traveler's carry-on at Tampa International Airport.
The cases involved animals hidden in luggage, clothing and other belongings. TSA's standing advice for anyone hoping to bring an animal along remains simple: check with the airline first. “If you're traveling with a pet, check with your airline before showing up at the airport,” the agency said, as quoted by creators.yahoo.com. TSA echoed that message following the Ontario incident, encouraging travelers to contact their airline ahead of time to learn its specific rules and requirements for pets.
