in reply to Re^2: extracting a list element
in thread extracting a list element

From delete

WARNING: Calling delete on array values is strongly discouraged. The notion of deleting or checking the existence of Perl array elements is not conceptually coherent, and can lead to surprising behavior.

Cheers Rolf
(addicted to the Perl Programming Language :)
see Wikisyntax for the Monastery

In Section Seekers of Perl Wisdom