With a tarantula roaming about, Delta calls off flight

There are a multitude of reasons your flight might be canceled or delayed -- but a spider?

It can happen. Passengers in the USA who were scheduled to board a Delta Air Lines flight from Baltimore to Atlanta thankfully avoided a potential in-flight run-in with a tarantula on Wednesday night (September 23).

Mexican Red-kneed Tarantula - How would you like to spot one of these crawling around during your flight?

Delta Flight 1525 was scheduled to depart Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport at 7 p.m., but before passengers boarded, an employee spotted the spider in the cargo hold. Baggage handlers were unloading the aircraft before turning the aircraft for departure to Atlanta when it was spotted.

Inside the Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport

The airline suspected that there was a cargo shipment of insects that was breached. The crew was notified, who subsequently made the decision to continue on another aircraft. Said the pilot,

"We have to make the safe decision on that -- being bitten by a tarantula is not a good thing.”

A Delta Air Lines Boeing 747-400 taking off from Los Angeles Airport

Passengers departed at 10 p.m. on a different aircraft. Delta said the spider was never in the cabin or seen by passengers or flight crew. The aircraft in question remained out of service on Thursday as it was cleaned and searched.

Luckily the tarantula was not spotted inside the Delta Air Lines cabin

The venom of tarantulas found in the United States is not considered dangerous or deadly, according to the U.S. National Library of Medicine, but it might cause allergic reactions. The pain of the bite is comparable to a bee sting.

The skyline of Midtown in Atlanta (viewed from Piedmont Park)

(All images - credit: Wikimedia Commons under Creative Commons licence)