Airline passengers reveal the WILDEST items ever confiscated at the airport

Did you think oversized toiletries or pocket knives were a problem?

Puzzled travelers have now revealed some of the strangest items seized at airport security. It involved everything from caviar to cannonballs.

In a Reddit In a thread titled “Seized Items at the Airport,” one user asked, “What’s your most interesting, funny, or weird story about items being confiscated from you at the airport?”

They added that the strangest item they had to hand over was a jar of honey.

The thread quickly garnered hundreds of replies. Here, we reveal some of the stranger stories of run-ins with the TSA.

Stunned travellers have now revealed some of the crazier items they’ve had confiscated at airport security, with everything from caviar to cannonballs in the mix (stock image)

Caviar

Caviar caused a problem for a traveler. The Reddit user revealed: ‘My father traveled from Russia back to our home country about 20 years ago.

“He had an average-sized can of caviar in his bag. He told me that he had checked three times to see if he could take it with him, but had not found any evidence that he wasn’t allowed.

‘Yes, he was stopped by security and told that this was not allowed.

My father was pretty sure that the security just wanted to take the caviar for themselves.

After arguing for a while, he opened the can of caviar and ate it all in front of them. [He then] thanked them for their time and moved on.’

A traveler’s caviar was seized during security checks when he returned from Russia (stock image)

Bread knife

An innocent house purchase turned out to be a nightmare for a traveler.

They wrote the following about the offensive kitchen item: ‘I bought a nice lunch box from a homeware store in Sydney and the store wrapped it up for me.

‘At the airport, security asked me what was in the bag and I told them. They then told me to stand back and not touch anything while they opened it.

‘I didn’t know the bread bin came with a 12 inch bread knife, which was in the bin. How embarrassing. And frustratingly, it was a damn good knife.”

Hidden bullet

Two American cruise passengers were recently arrested in the Turks and Caicos Islands after security found ammunition in their bags during a stopover.

And a Reddit user in the thread reiterated that bullets are also a no-go at airport security.

They recounted an incident: “I know a man who was an avid hunter, and at one point a single .22 bullet had gone through a hole in his pocket and lodged deep in the layers of fabric of his cargo pants.

“It turns out that the TSA takes a hidden bullet through security quite seriously.

“No charges were ultimately filed, but needless to say he missed his flight that day and now appears to have a lifetime supply of additional airport screening.”

Mathematical compass

A compass caused problems for one passenger at an airport in Egypt (stock image)

Attention designers and mathematicians: a compass caused a commotion at an airport in Aswan, Egypt.

The traveler said in the Reddit thread that the object was examined “very carefully” by several guards.

After the inspection, the guards concluded that it could be dangerous.

The Reddit user continued his story with the following: ‘One of the guys held it up, loosened the bolt and removed the small tip (it’s small, 4mm at most), looked at me angrily and threw the tip in a box with biohazardous waste.

“He put the rest of the compass back in the box and gave it back to me. I just laughed and said he could keep it… I mean, it’s pretty useless without any use.”

Dried mandarin

Check every nook and cranny of your suitcase before you travel, warns one Reddit user, after an old piece of fruit proved a nuisance during their trip through Los Angeles.

They wrote the following about the debacle: ‘LA airport security insisted we had imported food from outside the US in our checked luggage.

‘They kept us waiting for two hours and emptied our huge suitcase in fruitless attempts to find that food.

‘Eventually they came upon a dry tangerine that had been sitting in a corner of that suitcase for the past five years and proudly confiscated it.’

Space slime

Still haunting them to this day, another Reddit contributor revealed how an “amazing slime” of theirs was confiscated by airport security when they were around 11 years old.

They wrote the following about the events: [The slime] was my only souvenir I picked out for myself at the Smithsonian Space Museum in DC.

‘We went to so many that day, I really loved it. Our last one was the space slime and in the gift shop they claimed the slime was “space slime” of course just cool looking slime but as a kid I thought it was the coolest and most interesting thing ever and this was before slime was in every store was to find.

“So we went to TSA and they took it out of my backpack, I literally cried so much. I begged the lady not to do it, to the point where she felt bad and asked if we had another bag we could check. It hurt my little heart so much.

“Looking back, I know it wasn’t a problem, but for a little kid it really is.”

Following the traumatic incident, the Reddit user says they now always check their suitcases ‘twice’ before traveling to ensure nothing is ever thrown away.

Mustard

Many people in the Reddit thread revealed food items that had been confiscated by airport security, including jam, honey, and Nutella.

One of the respondents said she was surprised when Icelandic mustard they purchased at Reykjavik airport was confiscated upon entering the US.

They added: ‘The look of shock and sadness on my husband’s face still haunts me.’

Another traveler recounted a similar mustard debacle when traveling from Dusseldorf to Newark.

They reminisced: ‘It was a grainy mustard for me. It still hurts to lose it. It was a completely arbitrary decision.

‘In the meantime, I’m done with lighters, matches, pocket knives, etc. that were in a dark corner of a pocket or bag and had long been forgotten.’

Cannonballs

Cannonballs troubled an airport visitor in Mexico City (stock photo)

Skip the cannonballs when souvenir shopping, advises one Reddit user.

They revealed in the thread that they had purchased two baseball-sized cannonballs from an antique store in Cartagena, Colombia, believing they would make a “nice souvenir and only cost about $10.”

They wrote about the problems caused by the purchase of the new product: ‘I put the cannonballs in my hand luggage and flew from Cartagena to Bogota without any problems.

‘The next flight, Bogota to Mexico City, we still had them in our hand luggage. But when we went through security again in Mexico City, the security guard said we couldn’t fly with them.

‘We had very little time and didn’t want to miss our connecting flight, so we just left them behind.

“I’m not sure if we could have packed them in our checked luggage, but we probably shouldn’t have brought them on the plane in the first place.”

‘I later discovered that other tourists had also done this and that the airport had to be evacuated because sometimes there was still gunpowder in it.’

Handcuffs

Handcuffs caused problems for a handful of travelers.

A participant in the discussion forum said the following about the handcuff headache: ‘My handcuffs were confiscated in Morocco.

‘They were in the hold luggage, but at the airport you have to put all your luggage through a scanner before you can check in.

“So the security guard took them out of my bag in front of everyone. God bless him he had no idea what they could have been for. My husband had to convince him that we had no nefarious intentions.’