Passengers on a recent flight from Florida to New York were stunned as a monkey climbed out from under a man’s hat and perched on his ponytail mid-flight.
The fist-sized marmoset monkey was apparently smuggled aboard a Spirit Airlines flight in Lima, Peru, where the owner’s journey had begun.
The jet landed the following day in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, where the pair had to wait several hours before catching a connecting flight to New York, during which time the monkey still managed to remain undetected.
According to airline personnel Alison Russell, during the connecting flight people sitting near the man noticed that the marmoset, which normally lives in forests, had emerged from underneath his hat.
She said: “Other passengers asked the man if he knew he had a monkey on him.”
Following the discovery the monkey spent the flight’s remainder in the man’s seat and was well behaved.
On landing at La Guardia airport, New York, airport police were waiting for the man who was immediately taken for questioning; meanwhile the animal was confiscated and taken into quarantine by the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention.
It is expected that the monkey, nicknamed ‘Spirit’ for his spirited character, will be quarantined for up to a month and tested for possible diseases that could have put passengers at risk.
If he is found to be disease-free he will be released to a zoo, animal control officials said.
It does not appear that the passenger who smuggled the creature, which only weighed about a pound and hence was easily concealed, will face any criminal charges.
Though the incident has raised security and health concerns at Fort Lauderdale Hollywood International Airport where the monkey passed through customs and security screening without detection.
