A rider smuggling dozens of venomous vipers was stopped aft flying into the fiscal superior Mumbai, India from Thailand, Indian customs officials said.
The snakes, which included 44 Indonesian pit vipers, were "concealed successful checked-in baggage," Mumbai Customs said successful a connection precocious Sunday.
"An Indian nationalist arriving from Thailand was arrested," it added.
The rider besides had 3 Spider-tailed horned vipers -- which are venomous, but usually lone people tiny prey specified arsenic birds -- arsenic good arsenic 5 Asian leafage turtles.
Mumbai Customs issued photographs of the seized snakes, including bluish and yellowish reptiles squirming successful a bucket.
The snakes are a comparatively antithetic seizure successful Mumbai, with customs officers much regularly posting pictures of hauls of smuggled gold, cash, cannabis oregon pills of suspected cocaine swallowed by passengers.
However, successful February, customs officials astatine Mumbai airdrome besides stopped a smuggler with 5 Siamang gibbons, a tiny ape autochthonal to the forests of Indonesia, Malaysia, and Thailand.
Those tiny creatures, listed arsenic endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, were "ingeniously concealed" successful a integrative crate placed wrong the passenger's trolley bag, customs officers said.
In November, customs officers seized a rider carrying a wriggling unrecorded cargo of 12 turtles, and a period before, 4 hornbill birds, each connected planes arriving from Thailand.
In September, 2 passengers were arrested with 5 juvenile caimans, a reptile successful the alligator family.
English (US) ·