Why are 10,000 giant spiders on the loose in the UK?

The great raft spider or fen raft spider (Dolomedes plantarius) is a European species of spider in the Pisauridae family [Andreas Jakel/Getty Images]

This week, several newspapers and tabloids in the United Kingdom published claims that 10,000 mammoth spiders, which some said were as big as rats, had been let loose across the country.

One report in the tabloid the Daily Mail read: “Thousands of giant spiders ‘the size of a human hand’ are on the loose in the UK after a zoo decided to let them run free.”