A Qantas flight from Italy to Australia had to be grounded for a deep clean, and Southeastern pulled trains out of service after an outbreak at its West Marina depot near Hastings. Autumn travel season, it turns out, is prime time for picking up unwanted luggage passengers.
The numbers behind the creep factor are real: infestations are rising roughly 20 per cent a year in London and other big European cities, according to monitoring firm Valpas, which found bedbugs in one in 42 hotel rooms it observed. Frequent travel and growing insecticide resistance are helping the insects spread. The reassuring part? Bedbugs aren't a sign of a dirty hotel. Even five-star suites can host them, because the bugs simply follow human traffic.
So what should you actually do at check-in? Pest expert Dr Cassie Krejci's first rule: park your suitcase in the bathroom or another tiled floor before you inspect anything. Then kill the lights and sweep the room with your phone torch – bedbugs are nocturnal, so darkness is when they're active. Focus on mattress seams and crevices, where you might spot rust-coloured dots, shed exoskeletons, tiny black specks of dried excrement or small yellow eggs. Flip the throw pillows too.
Your nose can help as well. A large group of bedbugs releases an alarm pheromone often compared to the smell of expired raspberries or coriander. And don't skip the walls – check behind picture frames and wall hangings for dark stains, since the bugs are expert hiders.
If you do find evidence, photograph it and alert hotel staff or your rental host straight away. Most hotels have protocols: they'll move you and guests in adjoining rooms and bring in professional pest control. Meanwhile, keep your luggage in the bathroom on a clean countertop, away from the bed and walls, and hang clothes in the wardrobe rather than using drawers – bedbugs can't fly, so hanging items are harder to reach.
The final line of defence happens at home. Seal your suitcase in a dark plastic bag, unpack on a hard floor away from the bedroom, and run everything straight through a tumble dryer – the heat kills any stowaway that made it past check-out.
For anyone travelling through European cities this season, a two-minute inspection is a small price for avoiding weeks of itching and an expensive home extermination. It costs nothing, works in any star rating of hotel, and gets faster with practice.
