TSA Employees Reveal the Craziest Things People Have Tried To Bring On A Plane

The Transportation Security Administration exists to ensure the safety of people traveling to and from certain countries. They make sure that the things people travel with won’t cause them or others harm. And they do all of this while also protecting their countries and those of others from dangerous local and international threats. But sometimes, people don’t follow the rules, which means that TSA agents have lots of fun stories about weird things they’ve found.

These men and women who are tasked with the safety of others often find things like mannequin parts, decomposing animals, WWI remnants, crow soap (yes, that’s a thing), and more. And that’s exactly what you’re in for today. If you’d like to read about the strangest items that TSA agents found people trying to sneak through, just keep scrolling.

The Samurai Sword

About a week before 9/11, I was going through airport security alongside a 14-year-old kid and his mother, who were both returning from some kind of martial arts tournament. The kid was carrying a samurai sword. The security guy was all like, “I’m pretty sure you have to check that” and the mom flat-out told him they were not going to check it. Her reason was that it was too expensive, and that the lady at the ticket counter said it should be okay because it was a practice sword and not even sharpened.

The security guy just wasn’t sure, and so the kid drew the sword from the sheath and let the man feel the edge. Meanwhile, the mom reiterated that the ticket lady said it would be okay. The security guy shrugged, kid re-sheathed his sword, and the thing rode in the overhead bin across the aisle from me (they were on my plane). Reddit user: RiMiBe

Confectioner’s Sugar

My uncle is a cop, and one time, he had to take a guy who was stopped to the hospital. The guy was walking funny, and they could see some odd shapes when they scanned him. They thought he was a smuggler; they’d seen it a dozen times, but this poor bloke looked full.

They checked his bags, and there were multiple plastic contraceptives. The hospital scanned him, and they saw at least 10 bags shoved up inside him. They got all the bags out and called the FBI, because the guy tried to go across states. They inspect the powder and…it was confectioner’s sugar.

This guy probably cost the country several thousand tax dollars to shove some fine ground sugar into his body. His reasoning for why he looked like a runaway Keebler elf? “I just wanted to see if I could do it, you know? Guess I should have used less.” Reddit user: suitology

An Emotional Support Goose

When I worked at the airport, my job was to work as a ramp agent, and by far one of the weirdest things I ever saw was a goose. We processed an ’emotional support goose’ (that was its actual title), which is apparently a bird that acted as a soothing flight buddy for the passenger.

Nobody on the team knew how this goose did what it did, but our instructions were clear: to process it. It’s still the craziest thing I ever saw. Reddit user: RoightThen

Bald Eagles

I’m not a TSA agent, but one day, I was traveling, and while I was on the way to my gate, the terminal in between me and it was shut down. I guess someone tried to carry on a bald eagle. Because of that, my plane was delayed for almost 2 hours.

A month later, I was sitting at another gate waiting for another flight and heard a loud screech. I looked around and saw a big black box with some air holes. I heard a second screech and then saw a girl standing next to the box rifle through a bag and pull out a leather falconry glove.

I thought “no freaking way.” She opened the crate and, sure enough, pulled out a bald eagle. I’ve seen more bald eagles at the Phoenix airport over the last 4 months than I’ve seen my entire life in the wild. Reddit user: playfulbanana

Stick of Dynamite

I’m not an airport worker, but the guy standing directly in front of me while we were waiting to go through TSA worked for the government or something. His job was to see if he could breeze through TSA with sticks of dynamite in his luggage to test the workers and their attention to detail.

The airport staff failed obviously and horribly. I can only imagine the fines and how many people were fired that day. Reddit user: [redacted]

A Magnet

Believe or not, a high-powered magnet came through. This thing was so powerful that, while still in the bag, it was ripping off the rollers on our conveyor and literally took three adult men to get off. If you put this thing around 1.5 feet from a metal object and weren’t holding it properly, it would fly out of your hand.

This idiot who was working that day had braces, and if I didn’t stop him, he probably would’ve ripped out all his teeth. Just so strange and random. We didn’t let him take it with him. Reddit user: SuperSaiyanNoob

Sewing Shears

I had an old woman get really upset with me because we were trying to take away her sewing shears. They weren’t small travel ones but the gigantic steel ones that could cut through a flimsy suitcase easily. She demanded we physically break them apart in front of her because she didn’t want us to have them.

There’s no way someone’s doing that without tools, so we had her watch us throw them in the secure bin that airport police would empty every week. Reddit user: gowhitefish

The Massive White Bottle

While working for a company before security right near the TSA line, I witnessed a lady get denied entry due to a massive bottle of wine. They gave her two options; throw it away or drink it. Somehow, she got it open and drank the whole thing in what seemed like 1 second.

I was just in shock, as were the people behind me, as well as some of the TSA agents. She then proceeded on through. This was at like 6 am. Reddit user: tstc

Teeth

I once had a request for a private screening, which we usually took to mean that we were about to see something weird. The bag was incredibly heavy. After we went behind a curtained-off area, the passengers showed me six blocks of mixed metal, four huge bags of random pieces of gold, and two bags of human teeth.

Apparently, the couple made a killing off buying teeth from a crematorium. They were melting out the fillings and selling the resulting metal. It smelled bad. Reddit user: redmage311

Many, Many Toys

I was at LAX last summer and had an older woman in front of me at the TSA checkpoint; she was about 40-50 years old. She seemed uncomfortable when the TSA agents told her to open up her suitcase for inspection due to some metal detector tripping. Inside the suitcase were all kinds of special toys.

I’m not talking about your run of the mill rubber ones, I’m talking about porcelain ones, stained glass ones, marble(?) ones, dragon ones, ones with spikes on it, etc. The TSA agents were visibly disturbed, and one of them pushed another younger TSA agent to check it. They didn’t find anything illegal, so they let her go. Reddit user: nignogchingchang

Crow Soap

I’m a former airport worker, and the kinds of things we’ve seen the general public wouldn’t dare believe. I wasn’t present for it but saw the pictures afterward. A guy coming through customs was trying to bring a dead crow encased in black soap through. I believe it was meant for some religious practice….

We tried looking it up, but all we got was a lot of…well, crow soap, so apparently it’s a thing? Though that may be a brand that is just coincidence. Reddit user: Kii_and_lock

Scotch

One time flying through Amsterdam, a guy had opened his sealed package of expensive duty-free scotch when they would not let him take it on. He was so heartbroken that he didn’t get to bring it home but quickly found a solution. He opened the bottle and took a swig…and passed it down the line of people boarding the flight.

A flight that drinks together, stays together…or something. (Note: Amsterdam security screening is done at the gate, unlike most airports.) Reddit user: nlderek

A Bottom Buddy

My uncle brought this thing called a bottom buddy with him when he was traveling back to his parents’ home for the holidays. It’s an extender so fat people with little arms can reach their butts to wipe. I don’t know where he found it or how these things even exist, but they do.

He told the security guard that if she didn’t let him on the plane, the people around him would be in for a bad time. It was pretty hilarious to me. Reddit user: iDoctor

Matcha Powder

I used to work up in the bellies of planes stacking cargo up until I got hurt last year. By far the weirdest thing I remember was a massive suitcase packed to the brim with loose matcha powder. That’s right, there was no container or anything. I had no idea why anyone would need so much, but there it was.

The bag was so overstuffed that the zipper popped, and it exploded on the belt loader while being downloaded. Green powder everywhere. Reddit user: [redacted]

Adult Juice

As a TSA agent, I get really annoyed when people keep trying to bring large amounts of liquids through the gate. By now, everyone should know that too much simply isn’t allowed. One time, I watched a man argue about a 1/5th of “his favorite brand” of vodka for 10 minutes.

When it was clear that he wouldn’t be going through with it, he chugged it, then promptly had a heart attack. That was certainly weird. Reddit user: ErrorlessGnome

Seahorses

I’ve seen lots of things in my time as an agent, but this was for sure the craziest. It was five dead endangered seahorses. No one knows why or how he got them, but there they were. When the man tried to bring them through, they were confiscated after being found at the Detroit Metropolitan Airport.

They were spotted in a large bottle of alcohol (also prohibited) when the passenger’s carry-on was x-rayed. The seahorses were then were handed over to Michigan Fish and Game. Reddit user: [redacted]

A WWI Shell

I know a friend of a friend who works as an airport customs checker. She often tells us stories of the weird things people try to bring on a plane. By far the most shocking was when she said that a couple of tourists returning from Flanders Field in France had an unexploded WWI shell with them.

They were quite happy to show it to customs; they bought it from a dodgy stallholder and assumed it was defused since it was being sold as a souvenir. Nope. Reddit user: [redacted]

A Whip

Not an airport worker, but last year I traveled with a group of friends to the US. One of them is a professional horse racer and bought lots of sports stuff because it was cheaper. Including a whip. It was too large to go into any of our bags, so she carried it on in her hand at the airport. We got lots of strange looks that day.

When going through security, it got stuck inside the machine and wouldn’t come out. 15 minutes later and three people trying to reach inside, it was finally free. The workers couldn’t keep a straight face when she told them her whip was inside. Reddit user: [redacted]

Turtles

Good lord, we find lots of weird/unusual things that a normal person would never ever need. I’m sure if I kept thinking I’d think of something better, but this stands out right now; a young child, about 12 or so, had recently returned from a vacation in South America with his family.

He ended up going through the body scanner, and we found six small turtles in his cargo pants pockets. Border security was called in, the turtles had to be taken and tested for foreign diseases, and his parents were fined $2,000. Reddit user: mm94

A Bunch of Things

A live spider. The passenger didn’t know, but it was so large that we don’t understand how he didn’t see it. But he opened his bag, it crawled out, and I screamed. We also found human ashes and homemade toys, the creator of which gave me her business card.

We also found a live cat. Antlers with rotting flesh still on them. And my favorite was a magician’s bag that was alerted for explosives. He kept pulling bits out of pockets and showing me bits of his act. Reddit user: [redacted]

A Cooked Ham

This didn’t happen to me, but my mom volunteers at O’Hare at their traveler’s assistant booths all throughout the terminals. One of the employees of the traveler’s aid office told her about a woman who tried to bring an entire cooked ham through that had a giant wad of cash hidden inside.

I think she could have technically brought just the money, but I think there was a language barrier, so she didn’t understand why she couldn’t bring a giant ham on her flight…. Reddit user: Pinkie365

Cash and Magazines

At this point, I seriously believe that I’ve seen it all. There have been things like kitchen sinks and engine parts, but my all-time favorite was the man who came off a flight from Haiti after the earthquake. He had told us that he had lost it all and that his entire life was in his suitcase.

This suitcase was stuffed with nothing but cash and dirty magazines. No clothes. No keepsakes. No paperwork from his homeland beyond his passport. Cash and magazines. Reddit user: galebird

A Garden Gnome

My brother and his friend “borrowed” a lawn gnome from my mom’s evil roommate. In actuality, the roommate was just an evil toad of a person that no one could stand for more than three minutes. When they took it, they hid it in a suitcase and forgot all about it.

They both heard the TSA guy say, “Is that a gnome?” as it went through the scanner. Trying to hold back their laughter, no one said anything. Reddit user: motado

Chinese Throwing Stars

Not TSA, but I once bought my brother Chinese throwing stars for Christmas. When I went to travel home for the holiday, I totally forgot they were in my carry-on bag and ended up getting detained for like 45 mins while TSA and local DC police interrogated me. No present for my brother, but it was a great story.

On the flight back home a week later, my name was called over the intercom. I freaked, thinking they put me on some no-fly list. But no! I was a single traveler, and they bumped me up to first class! Reddit user: [redacted]

Ceremonial Knives

I’m not an airport worker, but as a passenger traveling through Athens (Greece) in 2009, I saw members of an extended family in traditional Arab wear attempt to bring several 12-inch ceremonial blades and a ceramic flask (like a cartoon moonshine jug) with gasoline/petrol in it. The worst part is that they were stunned when they were pulled aside.

Watching the lady working for airport security trying to explain why they couldn’t bring these items onto the plane using the very small number of English words that both parties understood was fascinating and painful in equal measure. Reddit user: Didsburyflaneur

Shampoo

A guy tried to take a big bottle of shampoo in his carry-on. The TSA guy told him to either throw it away or exit the line and check it in his luggage. The guy went on about how expensive the shampoo was and how he’d miss his flight if he exited.

The TSA guy didn’t care. The guy then said, “Well…at least keep it so that somebody gets some use out of it.” The TSA guy said, sorry, he couldn’t do it. Reddit user: Patrick Young

A Problem with the Machine

I used to work in the X-ray business, and we had rolls of lead foil that was used for shielding. Someone thought it would be a really funny joke to cut a piece of lead foil into the shape of a weapon and hide it in the pages of a book in a visitors’ carry on.

The security people at the airport saw it on the X-ray and alerted the police. When they searched the bag, nothing. They ended up individually X-raying every item in his bag before they found it in the book. They weren’t amused. Reddit user: [redacted]

The Main Ingredient

This was not at airport security, but I was coming back from Peru when I saw that one of the people in my tour group had tried to smuggle a big bag of cocoa leaves out of Peru. Coca leaves on their own aren’t that bad, as chewing on them can help with altitude sickness.

It also has a few other uses that are anything but bad, including but not limited to being very rich in minerals. However, coca leaves are the main ingredient one of the most used illegal substances, and as such, are not allowed in the US. Reddit user: [redacted]

Food…Tons of It

An old couple had a bunch of food in their baggage; it had started spilling out, had a smell, looked gross, and they even bought some bread to go with it. It was basically allowed, but I asked them why they bought it, and they said that they’d eat it. I was surprised.

I told them that the normal meals are free with your tickets, and they said that they knew, they just wanted to eat. I didn’t care, but it was strange. Reddit user: [redacted]

A Dangerous Toy

I once had to call law enforcement and write a huge report because some kid left a toy weapon in a bag (granted, it was metal, and the x-ray image was extremely scary-looking). My manager called it a ‘realistic replica,’ even though it clearly had an orange cap on it and everything.

I was mad because I had to spend hours upon hours writing the stupid report. It really ticks me off when people bring these difficult items to travel with. Reddit user: redmage 311

Dead Remains

Here are my top three as a pilot. I saw a Haitian try to bring a dead rooster and other voodoo trinkets, including knives, in his carry on. I also saw a person put a dead dog that was badly decayed in checked luggage. I would say it was dead over a week.

And then there was the group of hunters who ground up their deer, put it in cardboard boxes, duct taped it, and froze it solid. They expected the mass of the frozen block to keep the meat cool and not ooze blood onto everyone else’s stuff. Reddit user: [redacted]

A Mannequin

A friend of mine works as a flight attendant. She told me about the time some guy was stopped from going on a plane because he had a suitcase full of female mannequin parts. Those parts included the head, body, legs, etc., all taken apart. It resulted in his suitcase looking severely misshapen.

When it went through the screening process, security thought he was smuggling drugs and brought him to the back. But I saw him again just as I was about to board my flight; it just turned out he liked mannequins. Reddit user: [redacted]

A Tree Branch

While waiting for my plane from Cairns, Australia to Darwin and then eventually home to Canada, I witnessed a man wearing nothing but shorts attempt to navigate through security with a 10-foot-long tree branch. As if that wasn’t weird enough, his actual luggage, as well as his shirt, were hanging off the end of the branch.

It was so bizarre that the TSA agents didn’t know what to think, and neither did I. But it’s safe to say he did not get far. Reddit user: gav_man

Golf Tees

I had this male TSA agent confiscate one of my golf tees once. The funny thing is that I didn’t know it was in the bag. It must have come up weird on the scan or something. So, they pulled me aside and opened up my bag right in front of me.

He might not have confiscated it, but when he pulled it out of the bag and held it up, I told him, “You can have that if you want.” He didn’t put it back. Reddit user: Bryan Kautzman

Pens

I used to carry a lot of pens when I traveled. They were the cheap Bic pens that are like $7 for a pack of 500, but having an ample supply was very handy on more than one occasion. The TSA guy looked me up and down, didn’t even ask about the pens, but ended up taking them all; I was a little frustrated.

But I’ve learned to never argue with TSA. They have the ability to really ruin my day if they want. So, I just let it slide. Reddit user: Bryan Kautzman

Prize-Winning Jam

One time, I was at the airport when a woman in front of me got busted with several jars of jam. The TSA guy told her the same thing the other TSA agent told the shampoo guy before her. Either pitch it or else exit the line and check it in. “But you don’t understand. It’s JAM.”

“It’s a prize-winning jam! Open up a jar and take a taste!” The TSA guy declined to eat the jam. The woman, now in tears, threw away her prize-winning jam. Reddit user: Patrick Young

A Klingon Weapon

When I worked for ODEON (the UK’s largest cinema chain), I worked with a bunch of people who were more interested in movies than the average citizen. A colleague told a story of how she’d been to a Star Trek convention somewhere in the US. At the convention, she’d bought a cosplay prop….

This was discovered by the TSA staff as she tried to board. She was, of course, asked what on earth it was and (as she tells the story) started to fumble an answer. Imagine a fairly upper-class female British accent: “Do you watch Star Trek? I’ve just been to [specific fan convention]….”

“There’s this race called the Klingons, and they have them as a weapon-” “Ohhhh!” interrupted the TSA agent, “it’s a Mek’leth,” at which point she was allowed to board. Simpler days, when traveling to and from the USA was a joy. Reddit user: Mark Harrison

Hair Gel

A friend of mine was traveling on a military helicopter that suffered engine trouble. The helicopter was diverted to a civilian airport. My friend had his rifle, ammunition, and his pack with the rest of his gear. They were to be transported back from the airport on a scheduled civilian flight and had to go through civilian security.

Rifle? Fine, he had paperwork for that. Ammunition? Fine, he had paperwork for that. Bayonette? Fine, he had paperwork for that. Hair gel? Not fine, no paperwork allowing him to fly with hair gel. Confiscated. Reddit user: Dave Spinks

A List of Security Risks

This was not the TSA but French airport security in Nice. It’s only a short flight from Nice to where I live, so on the way to the airport, I had stopped at a supermarket to buy a few local delicacies to take home with me in a cool bag. But all of this was confiscated as a flight security risk….

Two packets of salted butter, a plastic pot of tapenade (mashed up olives), a jar of anchoiade (mashed up anchovies), and a plastic pot of lavender honey. Also, they took away a half-empty pot of The Body Shop shea body butter. Reddit user: Alexandra Ranson