Flights Direct

Last year 42.2 million pieces of checked baggage were mishandled or delayed at airports around the world – the problems ended up costing the air transport industry a massive $3.8 billion.

 “Once again, the past year has seen an increase in the amount of baggage mishandled worldwide. It also brings fresh hope, however, in the shape of new initiatives such as IATA’s Baggage Improvement Programme,” said Francesco Violante from SITA, who published the new figures in the annual Baggage Report.

Baggage handling is facing more problems each year as air travel becomes more and more popular. More demand, stricter security and very short turnaround times put pressure on handling 2.25 billion pieces of checked baggage every year.

The Baggage Report says that in 2007 the reasons for baggage delays were:

• transfer baggage mishandling, 49%;
•  ticketing error/ passenger bag switch/ security/ other, 14%;
•  failure to load, 16%; space-weight restriction, 5%;
•  loading/offloading error, 5%;
•  tagging errors, 3%;
•  arrival station mishandling, 8%