Pilot gets ‘Snakes on a Plane’ experience

CANBERRA: An Australian pilot said he was forced to make a harrowing landing reminiscent of a Hollywood thriller after a snake popped out from behind his dashboard and slithered across his leg during a solo cargo flight.

Braden Blennerhassett – unsure whether the snake was venomous – said his heart raced as he tried to keep his hands still while manoeuvring the plane back to the northern city of Darwin.

The snake popped its head out from behind the instrument panel several times, Blennerhassett said, and then the ordeal worsened when the animal crawled across his leg during the approach to the airport.

“I’ve seen it on a movie once, but never in an airplane,” Blennerhassett said, referring to the 2006 movie Snakes on a Plane, in which deadly snakes are deliberately released in an airliner as part of a murder plot.

The 26-year-old Air Frontier pilot wasalone in a twin-engine Beechcraft Baron G58 and had just left Darwin airport on a cargo run to a remote Outback Aboriginal settlement when he saw the snake on Tuesday.

Air Frontier director Geoff Hunt described Blennerhassett as a “cool character” who radioed air traffic control to report: “I’m going to have to return to Darwin. I’ve got a snake on board the plane.”

But Blennerhassett admits he was shaken: “My blood pressure and heart rate were a bit elevated.”