South Africa: Airline pilot successfully lands with a venomous snake lodged in his seat

“I had a great sensation, like I was pulling my shirt up,” Rudolf Erasmus, a South African pilot who suffered a major scare during his flight on Monday, told the BBC. He first thinks that he had not closed his water bottle properly and that it had spilled down his shirt… But he quickly realizes that a snake is next to him, lodged in his seat. . And it turns out to be a very poisonous cobra.

“When I turned left and looked down, I saw the cobra (…) move its head back under the seat,” testifies the pilot.

Emergency landing

So he was piloting a small passenger plane with four passengers on board and had to connect Bloemfontein with Pretoria, in the center of the country. But before the discovery of this fifth passenger, very poisonous, Rudolf Erasmus had to initiate an emergency landing procedure.

And despite the enormous danger he would then be in, the pilot managed to land his plane without incident at Welkom, located halfway along his route.

The pilot also describes a moment of total silence after informing his passengers of the presence of this unwanted traveler. Fortunately, this did not cause panic in the rest of the plane.

“(The pilot) remained calm in the face of a dangerous situation and managed to land the plane without any danger to himself or his passengers, showing the world that he is a first-rate ambassador of aviation safety,” the official said. Friday, director of the South African Civil Aviation Authority.

The authority’s representative also praised “the courageous decisions he made” and “the way he handled what could have been a major air incident,” while cobras are particularly venomous snakes that cause death if not handled. treated immediately.

The snake seen before takeoff

Rudolf Erasmus also told the BBC that the presence of this snake in the cabin was not a complete surprise. Two workers at the plane’s departure airport had indicated that they had seen a reptile under the plane before it took off.

Therefore, the pilot and the airport employees tried to find it before boarding the passengers… In vain. And after the incident, the cobra disappeared again.