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WASHINGTON TIMES (DC) 25 March 08 Rattlesnake in luggage injures Arlington man (Matthew Barakat)
(AP) An Arlington man was in stable condition yesterday in Inova Fairfax Hospital after reaching into his luggage and being bitten by a snake.
Officials have not determined how the reptile — preliminarily identified as a juvenile canebrake rattlesnake — got into the luggage.
The man, identified by authorities only as a coach at Yorktown High School, told fire and rescue personnel that he felt a sharp pain upon reaching into his luggage after returning from a team trip to South Carolina. Upon seeing the nearly foot-long snake, the man quickly slammed shut the luggage with the snake inside, said Chief Ben Barksdale, spokesman for the Arlington County Fire Department.
Fire and rescue workers took the suitcase outside, opened it and blasted it with a carbon-dioxide fire extinguisher, essentially freezing and killing the snake, Chief Barksdale said.
"The guy who responded had seen it done on TV," he said of the technique, adding that it can be effective for bees or other wild animals.
Chief Barksdale said he had no information that indicates the snake was placed in the luggage deliberately.
Bob Myers, director of the American International Rattlesnake Museum in New Mexico, said a snake could crawl into luggage to seek warmth or shelter, though his first instinct was to suspect some sort of prank.
The venom from a canebrake rattlesnake can be particularly harmful, but a juvenile rattlesnake is usually not large enough to deliver enough to be lethal, Mr. Myers said. Adult canebrakes can grow to a length of 6 feet.
"There's an old wives' tale that says a baby rattlesnake bite is worse than an adult bite, but that's just not true," Mr. Myers said.
He also said three or four people die each year from rattlesnake bites in the United States, out of perhaps 8,000 bites a year.
Rattlesnake in luggage injures Arlington man

How was he traveling? Bus or plane?
If it was a bus, I could see how a rattle snake could end up inside. On a plane however, I'd be looking around for Samuel L. Jackson.
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1.0.0 Great Plains Ratsnake
1.0.0 Corn, Lavender Aztec het for Amel
0.1.0 Black Ratsnake
0.0.1 Texas Rat (tame)
1.0.0 Broad Banded Water Snake, Hypo
1.0.0 Black Bassador Retriever
2.1.0 Godchildren, 1 Evil, 2 possible hets

WASHINGTON POST (DC) 29 March 08 Bite Victim Back Home After 3 Days In Hospital (Daniela Deane)
Andrew Bacas got a jolt, like an electric shock, when he stuck his hand in his suitcase. He thought it might be the extension cords he'd stashed in there.
That would be wrong.
It was a snake, albeit a little one, and he could tell by the shape of its head and its coloring that it was dangerous.
"It was like a spark going through my hand," said Bacas, 49. "I thought it was all that static electricity in the cords. But when I saw the movement, I knew there was something in there."
Bacas, 49, the varsity boys' crew coach at Yorktown High School, was back home in Arlington County yesterday after spending three days at Inova Fairfax Hospital, two in intensive care. The snake turned out to be a canebrake rattlesnake, one of the deadliest snakes in the United States, and rescue workers "froze" it with a carbon dioxide extinguisher.
Bacas had just returned home from a spring break conditioning trip to Summerton, S.C., with his team and was unpacking Monday when the 10-inch rattlesnake bit his right hand. Fortunately, this one was a baby.
Even so, by the time he reached the emergency room, his throat had constricted, and he was severely nauseous and suffering from abdominal cramps. Then he started sweating profusely. His initial blood work showed his platelet count and blood clotting factors were impaired, he said.
"They were worried I was going to get worse," said Bacas, who was given an antivenin serum. "Their biggest concern was critical organ damage."
Canebrake bites that result in death usually involve snakes much larger than the one that attacked Bacas, reptile experts say.
Bacas said that the swelling in his right hand, where he was bit in the fleshy part just below his pinky finger, has gone down but that he still has swelling in his arm and elbow and that several lymph nodes are raised. He said there's discoloration and tenderness.
"I may lose a bit of the musculature there," said Bacas, a private equity investor. "But hopefully there will be no major damage."
His encounter with the snake made national news.
Bacas said he's convinced that it slithered into his bag in South Carolina, where he had left it outside his room for the five days he was there. The bag was full of cords and ropes and "things that make for a perfect hiding place for a snake," he said.
When the snake bit him, he said he used barbecue tongs to pull everything out of the bag, one piece at a time.
"What was left was a perfect little circular coil, an itty-bitty brown snake with a triangular head and speckles," he said.
Bacas said he called his housekeeper, Thelma Rivas, who was downstairs, to the bedroom to help. He told her he had been bitten by a snake and that the snake was still in the bag on the bed.
"I pushed the bag shut, and she zipped it up," he said. "She's the one who trapped him in there."
Bite Victim Back Home After 3 Days In Hospital