80cm-long snake caught in Brussels restaurant

Staff at a central Brussels restaurant caught an 80cm-long snake on Tuesday.

Firefighters were called out to the restaurant, which has not been named, at about 15.40, a spokesman for the fire brigade said.

Staff had grabbed the non-venomous corn snake and placed it in a box. It is not clear whether diners were present in the restaurant at the time.

The firefighters took the creature to the Royal Belgian League for the Protection of Birds, in Anderlecht, which also rescues exotic animals.

The corn snake lives in the wild in North America and feeds on small rodents that it kills by constriction. It is likely to have been kept as a pet and escaped from its cage.