Fliers land in Mumbai, luggage still in Chicago

Mumbai: When Atul Singh (25), a Mumbai resident pursuing an Economics degree in the US, landed at the city airport on Monday morning for annual vacation, he was received by airline employees instead of his parents. The airline staff approached him even before he could reach the baggage claim area, and informed him that his luggage, along with another five to six passengers, had been left behind at the Chicago airport.
So, all Singh, the Andheri-resident who arrived here on an early morning Lufthansa LH 756 flight was carrying with him was his laptop and a few books.
While passengers losing baggage is a well-documented fact at airports across the world, airlines misplacing baggage is another regular occurrence that irks flyers’. Sudhakar Reddy, president, Air Passengers Association of India said the problem lies in the fact that airlines, especially from within the US, fly from eight to nine airports and disembark at hubs like Frankfurt from where all of them are further redistributed to another six to nine destinations in India. “At an airport like Frankfurt, you need at least an hour and half to transfer luggage from one flight or gate to another. If you have to change your flight in lesser time, there is no chance that you’ll get your luggage on time,” he said.
But airlines do not buy that argument. “At the end of the day, we are a service industry so why would we like to irk our passengers,” said a spokesperson for Virgin Atlantic airlines.
The basic baggage handling procedure includes moving baggage from check-in area to the departure gates, then interchanging passenger baggage between the gates and eventually moving them from arrival gates to baggage claim area.
But often the fault lies with passengers as well. “I have seen so many times when passengers pick up and walk away with wrong bags without even realising,” said an airline executive.
16/12/08 Shashank Shekhar/Expressindia

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Categories: Airports Dec 2008, Foreign Dec 2008