Reddit user u/Joecalone asked the airport workers of Reddit to share the weirdest items they've seen pass through security. The responses were bizarre, to say the least. Here are some of the weird, explicit, or just plain confusing items that passed through:
1. "My uncle once had to hand-inspect a case full of various-sized dildos because one of the dogs smelled something funny."
2. "The worst one was a 1-liter bottle of chloroform...wtf."
3. "'I can take a chainsaw through if I empty out the gas, right?' I just stared at him for a long time."
4. "Former ramp agent here. We processed an 'emotional support goose'; apparently it acted as a soothing flight buddy for the passenger...not sure how that works!"
5. "Cremated cat inside a leather satchel, inside a woman's vagina. Cremated in her fireplace, still had some fur and bones. Kid you not."
6. "Hunters ground up their deer, put it in cardboard boxes, duct-taped it, and froze it solid. They expected the mass of the frozen block to keep the meat cool and not ooze blood onto everyone else's stuff."
7. "One day, I was doing a bag check on a strange, dense metal item. It was a woman and her son. I didn't know what it was, but I knew it wasn't dangerous. Anyway, she saw what it was and yelled at her son, 'DON'T LOOK OR YOU'LL GO BLIND!' She whispered to me that it was a Kegel exerciser. I gave her the bag back and tried not to die laughing because of her poor, sheltered child."
8. "Friend works as a flight attendant. She told me about some guy who was stopped from going on a plane because he had a suitcase full of female mannequin parts — head, body, etc. — all taken apart. Apparently security thought he was smuggling drugs; just turned out he liked mannequins."
9. "Believe or not, a high-powered magnet. Yes, a magnet. This thing was so powerful that, still in the bag, it ripped off the rollers on our conveyor and literally took three adult men to get off."
10. "A guy once passed through with two suitcases filled with egg cartons. Empty egg cartons. That was it."
11. "I process military flights, and you wouldn't believe the crap people try to smuggle to and from operational theaters. Smoke grenades ('I forgot I had them!'), pen flares ('But it's not prepared to fire, though'), a magazine full of 5.56 rounds ('I didn't know it had to be empty'), and knives of all sizes hidden behind plates in body armor."
12. In Bangkok Airport, the check-in flight staff saw something sketchy on the scanner and unzipped the suitcase to find that a guy was trying to bring multiple bags of water with LIVE exotic fish in them on the flight. He was baffled as to why it would be a problem."
13. "I watched a man argue about a fifth of vodka for 10 minutes, chug it, then promptly have a heart attack. That was certainly weird."
14. "Some bald guy tried to bring lube through. I asked what it was for and he said masturbation. I let him keep it."
15. "My all-time favorite was the man who came off a flight from Haiti after the earthquake with a suitcase stuffed with nothing but cash and porn. No clothes. No keepsakes. No paperwork from his homeland beyond his passport. Cash and porn."
16. "I worked at the counter in Hong Kong Airport for a bit over two years. I saw a Mongolian delegation try to take about five crossbows through."
17. "I worked in a domestic airport in western Australia for two years. Considering it was just a mining town, a lot of weird crap went through there. A guy tried to smuggle several boxes full of reptiles with the Australia post shipments, which our airport had only started X-ray scanning the week before."
18. "I've seen someone fill an old laptop with ripped-up papers to stop the knife he had hidden in there from moving. He had porno mags in his bag on top of everything and was acting shady in general, so I was thorough in my search."
19. "I once saw a guy try passing security in a banana costume."
20. "When I was working for USAir, the TSA notified us that one of our passengers was flying with a checked bag that had around $6,000 in cash. It wasn't in a bundle or banded together, but just fifties and hundreds strewn throughout the bag."
21. "Customs worker here. Worst was someone trying to hide a rat in her bra, I guess!"
22. "I used to work as 'gate help' at an airport. One of my first 'customers' was a guy who I'm certain was a pirate captain from the golden age of piracy. He had a gold tooth and wore gold earrings. At first I just thought that this was his style, but when we passed through security, he had a big cloth bag of gold coins and a large bottle of some vintage-looking rum. He ended up missing his connecting flight because he had to check the treasure with his checked baggage."
23. "A whole wolf head in a carry-on. It was recently killed and packed up, but not preserved or stuffed yet. The joys of airport security in Alaska."
24. "Turtles, fireworks, and bleach. Same guy, same bag."
25. "Baggage handler here. Once, I was sorting out luggage until I found a rather peculiar bag. It was tied up with rope, very loosely closed, and just didn't fit the normal luggage look. I went ahead and grabbed it to throw it into the bag cart. As the bag hit the cart, the piece of rope holding it all together tore apart and its contents fell out. Lo and behold, pure white cocaine with bricks of marijuana wrapped up nicely to conceal the smell. Now, this was in 2000, so I don't remember any type of high security. I picked up the few bricks and popped them back into the makeshift bag."
26. "One time, a guy tried to smuggle a flamingo in a suitcase. He stuffed pillows and other stuff into the suitcase with the flamingo so if it moved around, there would be little to no noise. I guess he thought he could block it from the X-ray by covering it with pillows (obviously he has no idea how X-rays work). Anyways, he was arrested."
27. "Pancakes in a Foot Locker bag."
28. "My mom worked in airport security for a few years and had some funny stories. A man tried bringing on a hollowed-out grenade, now used as a paperweight, in his carry-on. They had to evacuate everyone in line. He shrugged it off and said he forgot it was in there and didn't think it was a big deal."
Note: Some responses have been edited for length and/or clarity.