Elderly couple try to take cockroaches onto flight

An elderly couple was found trying to take about 200 cockroaches onto a flight in Guangzhou, Guangdong Province on Saturday.

Security staff at Guangzhou's Baiyun International Airport discovered something abnormal when a container the couple were carrying passed through the X-ray machine.

When a young female staffer opened it to check its contents, a cockroach unexpectedly scuttled out.

Staff originally thought the cockroach might be caused by dirty luggage, but then they saw a white plastic bag inside with dozens of moving black objects. A closer look lead them to realize the moving objects were cockroaches.

The old man explained the cockroaches would be used by his wife to treat a skin disease after he read a folk recipe which said that mixing the cockroaches with some ointment and applying it to the skin has certain curative effects.

The old couple were forced to discard the cockroaches as they were not allowed to be taken onto the plane.