Terrified shopper finds world’s largest venomous spider with egg sac in Tesco bananas
14 April 2023, 13:28 | Updated: 14 April 2023, 14:28
A Tesco customer got the ‘fright of his life’ when he found a huntsman spider on his packet of bananas.
A shopper has revealed the terrifying moment he opened a packet of bananas to find a giant spider.
Craig Harrison was picking up his weekly groceries at Tesco in Windsor, and didn’t notice the creepy crawly until he got home.
So the IT worker was in for a shock when he found the huntsman spider clinging onto a large egg sac that could have contained up to 200 babies.
The huge spider is thought to have travelled more than 4,000 miles from the Dominican Republic before crawling out of Craig’s fruit.
Getting the ‘fright of his life’ 35-year-old Craig was forced to carefully manoeuvre the creature into a Tupperware box before it was sent off to the supermarket’s pest control service.
He said: “I don’t think I’ve ever had a shock horror reaction like it before, I was completely gobsmacked to discover it.
“I don’t consider myself to have a spider phobia, generally. This one was in a completely different league though!”
Craig has since warned other shoppers to ‘be vigilant’ when buying pre-packaged fruit and vegetables.
Tesco has apologised and offered him £100 in compensation for the shock, as well as alerting their provider.
A spokesperson said: “We were sorry to hear about Mr Harrison’s experience.
“We have robust processes in places to prevent spiders travelling with our fruit but on very rare occasions they can sometimes sneak through our suppliers’ checks."
What is a Huntsman spider?
Huntsman spiders can be found in tropical and temperate regions in the world and can span as much as 12 inches.
They hunt their prey instead of catching them in webs and feed on a variety of insects, such as caterpillars, moths, cockroaches and other spiders.
According to the Queensland Museum in Australia, most huntsman spiders will likely try to run away rather than bite.
While they are capable of giving painful bites if you disturb them, generally they will only cause short term pain, and possibly some swelling, itchiness, and inflammation.
