Newspaper Page Text
SUNDAY, DECEMBER 30,2012
Business
& Industry
Plane items
rife for losing
By Joe Taschler
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
From cellphones to
prosthetic limbs, passen¬
gers have a habit of leav¬
ing everything imaginable
behind on airplanes and
at airports, forcing some
airports and airlines to
put systems in place to try
to reunite lost items with
their owners.
Earlier this year the sit¬
uation became so unman¬
ageable for Southwest
Airlines that the airline
launched its own sophisti¬
cated computer software
to match travelers with
their wayward belong¬
ings.
“It really is mind-bog¬
gling the amount of
things that are coming
through," said Robert
Lehr, manager of central
baggage services for
Southwest. “The volumes
are just staggering.
“Basically, if you can
carry it on a plane, it’s
been left on a plane."
And during the holi¬
days — the busiest travel
time of the year, when
airports and airplanes are
packed with stressed peo
pie it stands to reason
that even more stuff
shows up on the lost-and
found pile.
But it’s not just air trav¬
el. People tend to lose
more items in December
than at any other time of
the year, according to sur¬
vey numbers released this
month by electronic data
backup firm Mozy.
"The times when peo-
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pic are busy and moving
around a lot cause peaks
in loss, so it may come as
no surprise that 6 p.m. on
Fridays and Saturdays in
December are relatively
disastrous when it comes
to hanging on to your
things," Mozy said in a
statement announcing the
survey results.
Anecdotal evidence
would seem to back that
up.
On Dec. 14, a Friday,
Southwest had 28 Apple
iPad tablet computers
turned in to lost and
found across its flight
system. Lehr said. It flies
about 3,800 flights a day
in the U.S.
The Mozy survey
showed 39.5 percent of
Americans lose two or
more belongings a year.
The survey also showed
the average person in the
U.S. misplaced nearly
$250 worth of posses¬
sions in the past 12
months. That adds up to
more than $30 billion of
lost property in the U.S.
this year.
While December is
ground zero, the tendency
to lose things is year
round.
Southwest typically
gets 10,000 to 13,000
items turned in to lost and
found every month.
That’s 120,000 to
156,0(X) items a year. The
airline has a warehouse
devoted to nothing but
storing and cataloging
things that have been left
on its airplanes.
“By and large, it’s
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Where's my...
Mozy surveyed 3,500
people in the U.S.,
United Kingdom,
Ireland, France and
Germany regarding
their experience of los¬
ing and finding items.
The top five things
people are most upset
to lose:
• Bank card
• Laptop
• Smartphone
•ID
•Wallet/purse
Top 10 things that go
missing (global):
•Smartphone
•Jewelry
•Sunglasses
• Keys
• Bank/credit card
•Clothing
• Umbrella
• Purse/wallet
•ID
• Paperwork
mostly electronic items,”
Lehr said. “We get tons of
cellphones.”
It’s not just high-end
electronics that are left
behind, though.
“Reading glasses we
just get thousands of, just
crazy amounts,” Lehr
said.
Seat-back pockets are
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the black holes of aircraft,
All sorts of things are left
behind in those pouches.
It’s so bad that Southwest
has adopted see-through
plastic mesh for seat-back
pockets as part of the
redesign of its aircraft
interiors, Lehr said.
Travelers aren’t just
leaving things on air¬
planes.
Milwaukee’s Mitchell
International Airport sees
thousands of items that
are left behind by travel¬
ers each year. The airport
has a team of volunteers
who deal with lost and
found items at the airport.
The list of items left
behind is long and ranges
from mundane (paper¬
back books) to head
scratching (oxygen
tanks).
Lost and found items at
the airport include sun
glasses cheap, design
er and prescription —
jewelry, clothing, car
seats, strollers, mittens.
gloves, credit cards, pass¬
ports and car keys.
There also have been
foam cheeseheads, wheel¬
chairs, crutches, garage
door openers and can
openers.
Volunteers are often left
to wonder how folks
managed to continue on
their journey without
their crutches, wheel-
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chairs or oxygen tanks.
Those mysteries remain
unsolved. (A local bot¬
tled-gas company ended
up with the oxygen tanks
when they weren’t
claimed by anyone.)
The same goes for
Southwest. "A prosthetic
leg was left on a plane,”
Lehr said. “A prosthetic
limb, we would think
they’d want it back pretty
badly.”
Jacki Servi Margis,
chairperson for the
Travelers’ Aid Board, a
self-governing volunteer
organization that staffs a
kiosk at the Milwaukee
airport and handles lost
and found, said volun¬
teers often become detec¬
tives when trying to find
owners of lost property.
“The volunteers go
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above and beyond,” she
said.
Southwest has a team
of employees who do
nothing but handle lost
and found items.
The airline sees the
effort as part of its overall
customer service mission.
Lehr said.
“These are people’s
possessions and someone
had that pit-of-the-stom
ach feeling with every
one of these things," Lehr
said. “We have to do
everything we can to get
the items back to their
owners.
“We have worked very
hard at this."
Worldwide, fewer than
half of lost items are ever
recovered, according to
the Mozy survey.