Littlehampton mum finds beast in bananas

Sharnie Brown, of Arundel Road, bought a sealed packed of Tesco Value bananas from the Broadpiece store late on Monday, but got more than she bargained for when she opened them.

“I can’t tell you what I shouted, it wasn’t nice! I just thought ‘what the hell is it?’

“I couldn’t believe it, it was horrible. It crawled out of the packet and sat on my worktop, looking like it was going to jump up at me.”

Mum-of-six Sharnie said she is allergic to spider and insect bites, and was ill for almost a month after a garden spider sank its teeth into her arm last year.

“I shouted to my son, Sam, who was in the front room, and he came running in and squashed it.”

Sam, 17, said he didn’t know what was happening when he heard Sharnie’s screams, and rushed straight to the kitchen

“She was screaming, then I was screaming, but I squashed it. I didn’t know what else to do. We looked on the internet, but we couldn’t find anything like it, though it did look a bit like a brown recluse.”

Brown recluse spiders, found in the southern states of America, are particularly dangerous, he added.

After calling Tesco customer services, Sharnie was offered a refund on the bananas, and a £25 gift card.

“I told them I was allergic to spider bites, and that this is my life they are talking about.I’ve got six kids. £25 wouldn’t feed them for a week!”

Sam described the spider as having a 2cm body, with legs extending a further 4cm.

A spokesman for Tesco said that as Sharnie had already thrown away the packaging of the bananas, they could not be sure of where the fruit had come from.

“We know it could not be a brown recluse, as they are found in certain places in America, and Tesco does not buy bananas from America.”

Tesco Value bananas come from a variety of places, including Ecuador, Costa Rica, Brazil and the Ivory Coast.

The spokesman added: “We are sorry for this exceptionally-rare find and for any distress caused.”