[smhenderson]

The whole article is a bit tongue-in-cheek, with it's references to "terrifying" even though it also says they're harmless. And the end, where he says to build a dome over GA now before it's too late, etc. I laughed out loud a little at that last bit.

So I think the plague reference was meant as another way to exaggerate the severity of the situation for humorous effect. That was my take anyway.

[Johnny555]

The whole article is a bit tongue-in-cheek, with it's references to "terrifying" even though it also says they're harmless

A spider the size of the palm of your hand sounds pretty terrifying to me no matter how harmless it is, but then I really don't like spiders of any size.

[brailsafe]

Ah, but they're just cute little things.

[sundarurfriend]

Hilarious that someone went to the trouble of downvoting you for this (comment is gray as I type this). Someone really doesn't like spiders.

[sundvor]

The Huntsman spider in Australia is similarly harmless one might believe - a useful pest controller as well.

Until one crawls across the windshield of your car whilst driving.

I'm glad I was the driver when it happened. I can still remember the screams of my then co-pilot, however. She definitely had arachnophobia.

[brailsafe]

I was shocked to come back and now find 17 points on it. Some people are absolutely petrified by spiders, and I take great joy in taking the harmless ones and letting them crawl on my hands and so on. They're a very polarizing creature

[chairmanwow1]

I thought it said the size of a child's hand.

[quantum_magpie]

Having come across them in Japan many times, they can get as big as 10 cm across. Slightly less than a hand, but still extremely distressing when you run face-first into one.

[jrumbut]

Why do I keep reading the comments on this story?

I'm booking a one way trip to the North Pole or wherever these flying spiders aren't.

[exhilaration]

Sorry bud: Spiders make up a significant portion of the animal population in the Arctic. - https://animals.mom.com/spiders-arctic-6713.html

Looks like we're both signing up for the first one-way trip to Mars.

[jrockway]

Some jerk is going to bring spiders and it will turn out that they're perfectly adapted to the Martian environment and it will just become the spider planet.

[NoahKAndrews]

Somehow I made it all the way here before processing, how huge this thing is