Los Angeles-based documentary film producer and cinematographer Erroll Webber had film equipment go missing from his luggage in Anchorage. Before checking bags on his United flight he stuck an Apple AirTags on one of the equipment bags.
Webber’s bag made it, he says, without the film equipment. But he was able to track it to the perpetrator’s house.
Hey @united, one of your employees at Anchorage Airport rummaged through my luggage and took some film equipment home with them. They inadvertently took my Apple AirTag that I had hidden.
Can you tell your employee who lives at: 210 Clover Hollow Court to give me my stuff back? pic.twitter.com/duwDAm0Igi
— Errol Webber (@ErrolWebber) November 1, 2022
While the former congressional candidate who sought to unseat Rep. Katie Porter (D-CA) in a non-partisan primary this summer assumes it’s a United Airlines employee who took the valuable items, that’s actually unclear. TSA, baggage contractor and airport employees may have had access to the bags as well. However it’s not difficult to determine residents at the address the AirTag tracks to. Hopefully he’s reported to the police in addition to sharing on social media (and hopefully Anchorage police haven’t quiet quit the way officers in Austin have, here they seem unlikely to respond to such a report).
AirTags are the new way to track down errant luggage. About six weeks ago another photographer tracked down his bags, which were taken at baggage claim with the chase ultimately taking him to a Miami home at 1 a.m. It used to be much harder to catch baggage thiefs, usually relying only on their own stupidity to unearth them – like when a TSA screener got caught stealing a CNN camera when he tried to sell it on eBay. He got caught because he forgot to remove some of the CNN stickers before the sale, and argued that TSA culture not only permitted but even encouraged baggage theft.
Thieving bastards.
@Gary, please keep up informed with follow ups on this. Thanks.
Air tags aren’t all that useful – I had one in my luggage on AA from LAS to ORD. The bag was supposed to be sent to the luggage service office and the air tag showed it on the tarmac as the agent brought it from the back. Maybe ORD baggage handlers all use Android phones?
ORDAL- When the air tags are used properly, they are quite useful.
David Miller – in the situation that I mentioned what could I have done differently that would have been more proper? Not trying to start an argument, I would honestly like to know..
ORDAL – I don’t know the details of your issue – you did not elaborate. If your issue is correct, it is the exception, not the rule. I have and do use these air tags and have never had a problem. Do you have more than one air tag? If so, have you had just an issue with this tag only? If you have others, have you had an issue with any of them? It is quite possible that your air tag is flawed – all I know it that mine work as advertised.
You need to upgrade your airtags to ver tincan. It’s what we use here.
FWIW, I’ve seen a bug lag in airtag reporting over the last six months. I have five of them sitting within 20’ of an iphone and last update is +25 mins ago. I expect an “upgraded service” available from Apple soon… for $$$.
Not sure why this is pertinent to the story:
While the former congressional candidate who sought to unseat Rep. Katie Porter (D-CA) in a non-partisan primary this summer assumes it’s a United Airlines employee