Airline baggage problems growing worse
WASHINGTON (AP) — Add this to the nightmare scenario for
summer air travelers: the growing chance that their baggage
is on another flight, possibly to a different destination.
A congressional panel on Wednesday seemed sympathetic,
but left the clear impression help is not on the way.
"I'm afraid more baggage turmoil is almost an inevitability,"
said Rep. John Mica, chairman of the House Transportation
and Infrastructure Subcommittee on Aviation.
Mica, R-Fla., noted that the number of mishandled bags was
23% higher in 2005 than in 2004. For every 1,000 passengers,
there were 6.04 reports of bags that were delayed, lost,
stolen or damaged last year, according to the Transportation
Department.
The likelihood that bags will be lost or late increases with air
travel volume, and this summer is expected to be the busiest
ever.
Not only does the Federation Aviation Administration predict
record numbers of passengers this year, but airplanes will be
more crowded than ever.
The airlines are ready for it, said David Castelveter,
spokesman for the Air Transport Association, which
represents large airlines.
"We do not expect a meltdown," he said.
John Meanen, the group's executive vice president, told
lawmakers that there are not any systematic solutions to the
problem of mishandled bags.
Some people have suggested, for example, using tags for
wireless tracking of luggage.
But most of the time, said Meanen, "We know where it is, but
it isn't where it's supposed to be."
When the number of mishandled bags jumps, it usually is
because an airline is having a specific problem, Meanen said.
Often the problem is staffing, he said.
Too few workers was the reason for massive problems with
US Airways passengers' bags over the 2004 Christmas holiday
season, according to a report by the Transportation
Department's inspector general.
That December, 42% of consumer complaints about baggage
had to do with US Airways, said Samuel Podberesky, an
assistant general counsel at the department. Those problems
continued into 2005 and may account for much of the
increase in the number of mishandled bags that year,
Podberesky said.
"One-time anomalies are not likely to be repeated on a
regular basis," Podberesky told the subcommittee.
US Airways has since hired thousands of employees, but many
financially struggling airlines have trimmed staff to cut costs.
"I'm particularly concerned that airline staffing requirements
may be too thin," said Rep. Leonard Boswell, D-Iowa.
Security delays also can cause bags to be lost or to arrive
late, Mica said.
Last summer at Fort Lauderdale Airport in Florida, Mica said,
delays in screening passengers caused "near riots."
He believes the Transportation Security Administration ought
to speed the screening of checked bags by installing bomb-
detection machines as part of the airport conveyor belt
systems that move luggage.
Only 14 airports have done so, and of those, only three of the
busiest — San Francisco, Boston and Denver — have, Mica
said.
The TSA's acting assistant administrator, Charlotte Bryan,
told the panel that 29 airports will have the systems in two
years. She noted that less than one-tenth of 1% of bags were
lost or damaged because of TSA's security screening.
Meanen echoed that thought, pointing out that 99% of
checked bags arrive undamaged and on time.
But, he said, as a former baggage handler, "I apologize to
everyone whose bag was lost or delayed."
Airlines packed in more fliers last month
By Dan Reed, USA TODAY
New performance reports from airlines suggest that
jetliners in the USA flew more full last month than in any
April in history.
A United Airlines
customer service
clerk assists a line
of travelers at the
busy Chicago
O'Hare International
Airport.
By Nancy Stone, AP
And the early results from April, which indicate that more
than 80% of U.S. airlines' seats were filled with paying
passengers, portend a record-setting — and uncomfortably
crowded — summer travel season ahead.
READ MORE: Airline baggage problems growing worse
Seven airlines that have reported for April all show fuller
planes. No. 4 Northwest ran fullest: 84.9%. No. 1 American
filled 81.7% of its seats. And No. 5 Continental filled 82.9%.
No. 3 Delta, despite a public battle with pilots over cost
cuts that included threats of a strike or shutdown in mid-
April, filled 77.6% of its seats. Even discounters Southwest
and AirTran, which normally record load factors lower than
the big network carriers, came close to filling 80% of their
April seats.
Filing such a high percentage of available seats systemwide
means that flights on the most popular routes at the most
convenient times were likely to be flying full. Traveler Lou
DeLuco, a sale representative from Scottsdale, Ariz., said
the crowded conditions lately have landed him more and
more often "in the back of the plane or in the dreaded
middle seat."
For all of 2005, the domestic airline industry filled 77.6% of
its seats, according to the Air Transport Association. The
April numbers are good news for an industry that has lost
more than $40 billion over the last five years. Better yet
for the industry, travelers have been paying on average
about 13% more for their tickets than last summer.
But ATA chief economist John Heimlich said in the group's
2006 outlook statement, published in January, that despite
big price increases since last summer, "passenger revenue
is about $25 billion per year below where it ought to be
based on the historical relationship between spending on
air travel and the nation's economy."
The industry's flying capacity is expected to shrink about 2%
this year, but consumers are already feeling the squeeze,
physically and fiscally.
Frequent-flier Kathy Brousseau, a data warehouse
consultant from Lexington, S.C., says its difficult to get
seats and "to get them at a reasonable cost," because Delta
has both reduced the number of flights to nearby
Columbia, S.C., and downsized its service there to regional
jets. "The flights are full and generally overbooked."
Flying in coach is "like being in a two-seat convertible with
eight people to begin with," says Glenn Floyd, a human
resources executive from Vancouver, Wash. Now, with
planes so full, "creature comforts suffer" and both the
boarding process and in-flight service are much slower.
And, he says, "It seems the patience of the flight crews has
been depleted."