14 DAY TRIAL // You never know what people may try to get through the border. Officials at Birmingham Airport seized a giant 4-foot (1.21-meter) squash from a passenger who tried to smuggle the huge vegetable into Britain.
The vegetable weighed in at 56 pounds (25 kilos) and was found in a consignment by environmental health workers.
“The rather unusual giant squash was found illegally imported at Birmingham Airport by our environmental health food safety team.[...] It is a bit of a rare find, as you can imagine we do get cigarettes a lot, but not a squash, especially not one of this size,” Solihull Council officials said, according to Metro.
The smugglers were also trying to sneak in 175lb (79kg) of fish and 94,000 cigarettes from Bangladesh.
The authorities also discovered 2,000lbs (907kg) of illegally imported betel leaves in three separate shipments. Betel leaves are a mild stimulant that is very popular on the Indian sub-continent. However, the leaves are temporarily banned by the European Union due to a concern that they may be carrying salmonella.
“Many of the boxes of leaves were mislabeled or packed at the rear of the consignment. Some of the leaves have been sent to a laboratory for analysis,” the authorities added.