If you’ve ever felt out of your element upon boarding an airplane, imagine how these marine creatures must have felt.

A Costa Rican man arrived at the Juan Santamaría International Airport outside of San José, Costa Rica Saturday, November 4 with a dozen or so hermit crabs stashed into two Tupperware containers with holes poked in the top.

A failed school science project? Who knows … Costa Rican police were baffled by the find and are still unsure of why the man attempted to travel with these lowly crustaceans stowed in his carry-on luggage.

Arturo Meléndez, head of the airport police, said he coordinated with the Costa Rican National Animal Health Service who confiscated the crabs, and “returned them to their natural environment.”

Nothing further was reported about the Costa Rican man who would have flown with crabs.