Baby sharks, live smoke grenades and concealed knives: airport security reveals its top 10 catches

Travellers have tried to get some strange things past airport security in the last year if the US Transportation Security Administration (TSA)’s list of “top 10 catches” is anything to go by.

The list includes the weird, wonderful and downright dangerous items found and confiscated during luggage inspections in 2020.

One of the stand-out catches, in at number six, was a dead baby shark contained in a jar of liquid preservative.

The shark itself wasn’t a problem, according to agents, but “the chemical was deemed to be considered a hazardous material and as such, was not permitted to be carried through the checkpoint.”

Agents also found various prohibited items concealed in passengers’ luggage, including a book containing concealed knives, drugs hidden inside a shampoo bottle and a long-barrelled gun stashed in the lining of a suitcase.

Another strange entry, in at number five, was a homemade humidor for a traveller’s cigars – agents mistook the odd-looking contraption for a pipe bomb.

But TSA deemed the biggest “catch” of all as the two TSA canine handlers at Newark Liberty International Airport (EWR) who “caught each other” when they got married in June.

“On June 25, 2020, two TSA handlers professed their fur-ever love for each other! How dog-gone cute is that?” the TSA previously wrote of the couple’s nuptials in an Instagram post.

Top 10 catches

1. Married TSA dog handlers

2. Suspicious electronic device with the potential to explode

3. Long-barrelled gun hidden in the lining of a suitcase

4. Marijuana stashed in a shampoo bottle

5. Homemade humidor for a traveller’s cigars

6. Dead baby shark

7. Live smoke grenade

8. Roman candles (fireworks)

9. Book containing concealed knives

10. Slingshot

Read More

Twice as many guns seized at US airports last year