Passengers reveal the very normal items in their carry on bags that got them stopped by airport security

AIRPORT security checks can be very strictly these days, with everything from baby formula to your gadgets being scrutinised over.

While it’s all in the name of air safety, for some unlucky passengers, it’s the very normal things in their carry-ons that gets them into trouble when going through airport scanners.

Travellers have taken to to share the every day and perfectly legal things that they’ve tried to take through airport security – and which subsequently got them stopped for a second check.

The items mentioned ranged from souvenirs to sweet wrappers.

Sometimes it was down to the way they were wrapped, and other times it was because they don’t appear in x-rays as they do in real life.

Read on to find out some of the things you might want to avoid taking through security…

Bringing home the wrong kind of souvenir

Chess might seem perfectly harmless in real life, but through an airport x-ray, they might appear to be something completely different.

User yodasears revealed: “I bought my parents some souvenirs, and got them gift-wrapped and thought no more about it.

“On our way home, I am passing through customs in the UK, and get stopped, and shown the x-ray, and asked why I am carrying bullets.

“I have no idea, and tell them as much. We go into a side room, and they open up my bag… and tear open my dad’s present.
“Chess-sets look a lot like bullets through an x-ray machine.”

When things aren’t seen the right way up

It’s not every day that you bring shoe horns security, but if you do, you might want to be aware of how they might appear from a different angle.

Writing on Reddit, user enderxzebulun said: “I got pulled aside leaving Greece because of what looked like a knife in my luggage on the X-ray machine, it was a shoehorn lying on its side.”

Feeling like a bit of a mug

User Spearhavoc999 found out the hard way that you might not want to wrap a mug too well.
They wrote: “I bought a large mug in Riga, Latvia and on my way home to Canada via Zurich I wrapped the mug in the wool blanket I had bought in Latvia.

“The wool made the mug look very dense and obscured the view of what it was in the X-ray machine.

“I had 3 very large security men approach my bag like I had an explosive and had to have a very awkward conversation about what “dangerous item,” I had in my bag.

“We were all relieved when the mug turned out to be a mug.”

Remember what you put in your pockets

When Reddit user ReadWriteSign brought a cat toy through security, they got more than they bargained for.

The traveller revealed: “I bought my mom’s cats a pair of toy mice with “real squeaking sound!” and one cat destroyed one of the mice in just the few days I was there.

“The squeaker turned out to be a disk, like the shape of a watch battery, about the size of a quarter. I put it in my jacket pocket to stop the cat from trying to eat it, and forgot about it.”

It wasn’t a problem until it came to airport security.

ReadWriteSign wrote: “TSA asked me what was in my pocket and wouldn’t let me touch the jacket to find out, nor would they reach in themselves.

“I finally remembered, told them it was the squeaker from a cat toy. They didn’t believe me until I got them to take it out and tap it. It made “real mouse sounds” and they laughed but for a moment there I was worried.”

Not just a simple treat

Thinking it was just a treat, user Rednblack99 brought a Terry’s chocolate orange through security.

But when the airport staff “freaked out”, he discovered that “apparently spheres suspended in packaging look just like bombs”.

Another problem with treats

The Terry’s chocolate orange incident wasn’t the only sweet related one.

For that1whitedude, it was a mini Milky Way.
He revealed that he was pulled aside while going through an airport scanner and questioned about an unusual item in his pocket.

The first time flyer wrote: “I put my hand inside, and pull out the wrapper of a mini milky way…

“Got shook down over a 1 inch candy bar wrapper!”

Be careful how you wrap them

User ghalta was another traveller who had an issue with a sweet treat.
They wrote: “I went through once with a box of Pop Tarts in my carry on, with my headphones looped around the box and the headphone cord kind of coiled around that.

“Pop Tarts are pastries packed into three little foil pouches all together, which apparently look suspicious when wrapped with wires.”

Sometimes passengers do try to smuggle things through security that they shouldn’t.

Earlier this week, Sun Online Travel revealed how one passenger was trying to squeeze a boa constrictor through security.

The unidentified traveller was apparently caught after airport security spotted a large bulge in his trousers.