Missed Flight with checked in luggage

John T Carroll

Quite recently, two friends of my wife were flying to Spain with a well known Airline, they had checked in online and checked in two bags at the Airport. They then went for a meal but for one reason or another (their own fault) the boarding gate was closed and they missed the flight.
Whats supposed to happen under those circumstances? can the luggage be identified and removed without unloading all the other luggage?. About 10 years ago, just before boarding a flight from Tenerife to Cork with Spanair one of the passengers fell down the boarding stairs and had to be removed. We sat in the plane for two hours while most of the luggage was unloaded, the gentlemans case identified and removed and the luggage was then reloaded and off we went. I have been on dozens of flights since and have never had a re occurance of this but surely, someone must have missed one of these flights after checking in luggage.

veetwin

Generally the luggage can be quickly identified even if a few bags have to be removed. There probably would be an awful lot more luggage on a Tenerife flight with Spanair than a Ryanair or Aer Lingus flight to Spain where most of the passengers will have carry on only due to punative baggage charges nowadays. Off loading of luggage is common enough and usually won't delay a departure.

Louche Lad

I'd thought, but maybe I'm wrong, it was now illegal for flights to leave without passengers whose luggage was on board.

John T Carroll

Louche Lad wrote: »

I'd thought, but maybe I'm wrong, it was now illegal for flights to leave without passengers whose luggage was on board.

I certainly hope so.

Fred Swanson

This post has been deleted.

kindalen

its much easier and quicker to find a bag if the luggage is containerised.

Locker10a

Fred Swanson wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

This is allowed, however bags may not travel if the airline is aware that a passenger will not\can not travel

John T Carroll

Locker10a wrote: »

This is allowed, however bags may not travel if the airline is aware that a passenger will not\can not travel

Yes, but do they check that the passenger has actually boarded his own plane first, I wouldnt think so due to timing etc.. I know it doesnt make any difference to the plane that his luggage is on but if he is up to no good he would certainly be aware that he wouldnt arrive at his destination until afer the scheduled time of the other plane and that he would be a prime supect pretty quickly if anything happened to the preceding plane, cant say I'm too happy with that idea in today's world.

Locker10a

John T Carroll wrote: »

Yes, but do they check that the passenger has actually boarded his own plane first, I wouldnt think so due to timing etc.. I know it doesnt make any difference to the plane that his luggage is on but if he is up to no good he would certainly be aware that he wouldnt arrive at his destination until afer the scheduled time of the other plane and that he would be a prime supect pretty quickly if anything happened to the preceding plane, cant say I'm too happy with that idea in today's world.

But how would he be able to predict that his luggage may go on an earlier flight?

John T Carroll

Locker10a wrote: »

But how would he be able to predict that his luggage may go on an earlier flight?

A very good point, no, of course he couldnt predict it.

smurfjed

What happened to the passengers? Were their flights cancelled or did the airline send them on a later flight?

Our rules are easy, if the passenger doesn't board, the aircraft doesn't move until their luggage is removed.

droidman123

I,m not trying to be funny op,but why dont you just ask your wifes two friends what happened?

John T Carroll

droidman123 wrote: »

I,m not trying to be funny op,but why dont you just ask your wifes two friends what happened?

I will, or get my wife to do so, when they return from holiday.

keithclancy

Also happens on flights with short connection times.

E.G. Flying to Venice via Rome from New York our connection time was only 1 hour so we made the flight but our bags were put on the next flight and delivered by Water Taxi to our hotel

John T Carroll

John T Carroll wrote: »

I will, or get my wife to do so, when they return from holiday.

Update on above, their luggage was removed, they got the next available flight, two days later.