Hamsters on a Plane

132 of them!

Today I’m thinking about the 2024 incident in which 132 hamsters escaped their cages in a passenger plane’s cargo hold, grounding the plane for days while the crew conducted a painstaking hamster manhunt.

Why were there so many hamsters on a commercial aircraft? Apparently, it was a pet store delivery, complete with hundreds of other small animals that weren’t crafty enough to escape. This makes me curious what the hell else is down in the cargo hold on any given flight, but maybe it’s better I don’t know.

I wonder about the moments leading up to the jailbreak. How did it go down? Did a cohort of particularly bold hamsters lead the charge? Or was it more organic — the flashpoint of 132 hamsters pushing en masse for freedom at 30,000 feet?

The image is horrific and ludicrous in equal measure. I love it.

I think about the crew members who started their day as flight attendants and ended it on all fours, crawling through rodent feces as they hunted down 132 tiny moving targets in a tight space with endless nooks and crannies.

Sometimes it feels like my days are spent in the same way… hunched over a computer, searching for something that doesn’t want to be found. It hides from me and gloats at my failure to grasp it, showing itself in quick glimpses before darting away.

Sure, there are days when I feel like one of the hamsters. Stay with me. Those little guys had to have been on a massive high after having broken the shackles of captivity. In that state, you just know they were nimble as fuck. As close to flow state as hamsters can get, probably. They scurried and climbed and burrowed with an alacrity even the most agile of them didn’t know possible. They couldn’t be stopped! Just like my… fingers on the keyboard when I’m in a flow? I don’t know. Now I’m losing the thread.

Today is not a hamster day. Maybe tomorrow.

P.S. All the hamsters on that plane are dead now :/ Apparently, they only live a year or two. Just something to think about. xo