Saskatoon woman helps other find missing bags after airline loses luggage

A Saskatoon woman spent 10 days in Mexico over Christmas without any luggage, but that didn’t stop her from helping two strangers track down their own missing bags.

Michelle Linklater said she booked WestJet flights for herself and her daughter to spend Christmas in Cancun. Their plan was to fly from Saskatoon to Calgary, then continue to Mexico on Dec. 20.

While she’d heard about chaos and flight cancellations at several airports, Linklater said their trip only saw one minor change – an added stop in Edmonton between Saskatoon and Calgary.

The mom said she’d decided she and her daughter would collect and transfer their luggage themselves in Calgary in order to ensure their bags ended up at their destination with them, but when they disembarked in Calgary, their luggage never circled the carousel.

Linklater said she was informed by an airport employee that nobody on her flight was getting their luggage because the airport was extremely short-staffed. The baggage, she said, would not be unloaded from their plane that night, so she and her daughter were instructed to return at 3 a.m. to retrieve their bags.

When they returned to collect the missing baggage, Linklater said they were met with a scene of chaos with many travellers hoping to find missing luggage. But instead of getting their bags, the two were told to fill out a baggage claim and were assured that their bags would meet them in Cancun.

“My luggage never did arrive. I never received any emails to say where my luggage was,” Linklater said. “We were on vacation for 10 days. I had Christmas presents in there.”

It was at the Calgary airport that Linklater said she realized the scale of the problems passengers were facing.

“There were so many bags all over the floor, and that’s when I realized there was a problem,” she said.

While she was searching for her own bag, Linklater said she spotted a phone number attached to a piece of luggage that wasn’t hers. Curious, Linklater said she called the number and asked the woman who answered if she was looking for her luggage.

The woman on the other end told Linklater she had no idea where her baggage was, and Linklater informed her she’d found it. Linklater said she spent the next several minutes gathering together the other pieces of luggage belonging to the woman before meeting her at the airport and reuniting her with the wayward baggage.

“She said it was like a Christmas Hallmark movie. She was so excited to get her luggage,” Linklater said.

Linklater said she was able to reunite another traveller with her luggage after arriving in Cancun using the same method — simply calling a phone number attached to an unclaimed bag.

In Cancun, Linklater said she and her daughter experienced problem after problem. Their phones weren’t working in Mexico, she said, which kept them out of touch with WestJet.

As a result, she said they resorted to shopping to replace the missing bags and contents, but it was a pricey prospect. The cheapest piece of luggage she could purchase at a Walmart in Cancun cost about $130, she said.

She said the shopping trips weren’t how she intended to spend her holiday. While she was in a warmer climate, Linklater said not knowing where her luggage was left her feeling quite stressed during a trip that was meant to be relaxing.

While some may expect issues when travelling over the holidays, Linklater said she disagrees.

“We pay for a service and, sure, weather may impact the flying ability, but service and staff is a whole different situation,” she said.

Airport rooms full of ‘bags and bags and bags’

When the pair returned to Calgary, still without their bags, Linklater said she asked an employee where she could find her luggage. She said she was told about special rooms in the airport filled with luggage that never made it to its destination.

“There (are) bags and bags and bags of luggage in these rooms, and they’ll let you go and sort through them,” she said. “They had five rooms just of WestJet luggage.”

Unfortunately, none of the bags inside belonged to her, Linklater said.

In Saskatoon, she said she was astonished when she saw five more rooms filled with luggage, though once again none of the bags inside were hers.

“These rooms are large and there is luggage everywhere,” Linklater said. “I see the amount of luggage, and when they’re being hid in these rooms and people don’t know about these rooms, how possibly could you know where your luggage is?”

Linklater said she believes there should be an easier way to connect passengers with lost luggage, even if it means making lists of every bag put in the storage rooms and posting it online.

CJ Dushinski, spokesperson for the Saskatoon airport, said all luggage is handled by individual airlines, and is not the responsibility of the airport authority.

“We would be unable to comment on the number of bags an individual airline is storing,” she said.

“Unfortunately, we do not have any recent information on these statements,” said Krista Ouellette with the Calgary airport.

In an email on behalf of WestJet, media relations adviser Madison Kruger said the airline’s baggage teams have been left with tremendous quantities of luggage to sort through after the large number of flight cancellations seen throughout the holidays.

She said employees are working around the clock trying to return bags to passengers, and hope the remaining luggage will all be delivered by the end of the week.

She added WestJet’s unclaimed baggage at the Calgary airport is placed “in an enclosed and secure area for processing that is not openly accessible to the public.”

Linklater said she regrets not packing some essentials in a carry-on bag, and instead of relying entirely on checked baggage.

“I tried to make the best of it, but it still was really stressful,” she shared.

Linklater said she got an email on Saturday informing her that her missing luggage had finally been found, but it was in Cancun after arriving there on Dec. 23.

Because she’s already purchased replacements for the gifts other items that were lost along with her bags, Linklater said she will have to deal with insurance to settle her losses. She said she’s assuming that unlike those she helped, she won’t ever see her own lost bags again.