Travelling devices
February 26th 2008 07:30
One of the hardest jobs while we were travelling last year was hauling our luggage around. When we had everything with us, as we did coming home (naturally there was more than there had been on the way out), the luggage was so heavy we had to get a trolley to move everything along. Painful. And believe it or not, we’d left two boxes of stuff behind that was coming by sea. Don’t go away for six months at a time.
(Those boxes haven’t arrived yet, although I believe they should be here this Friday. Fortunately they didn’t arrive while we were in the middle of the chaos of putting down the carpet. )
I saw on a site discussing travel from the Cayman Islands the other day that the theft of baggage is huge even in that relatively small country. I must say we were fortunate in this respect, or perhaps, (as the writer of the article suggested) it was because none of our luggage looked like it was worth snaffling and investigating for potential goodies. The laptop travelled with us at all times, and apart from that we had very little else that was worth anyone stealing. Whoops, forgot my wife’s Ipod, which she wouldn’t have been impressed to have had filched. It also travelled as part of our hand luggage.
The writer of the article (which I’ve lost track of, otherwise I’d include the link) said that when people have brand new travel supplies they look as though they ought to contain something valuable, (the bags, not the passengers) and this entices the thieves.
The problem is that life is very easy for the airport thieves. Who’s keeping an eye on dishonest staff? In most major airports there are so many hiding places you could probably grab all the luggage from several flights and none of the other security personnel would notice. Stuff it all in one of the innumerable toilets for a while, put an ‘out of order’ sign on the door, and you can deal with it later when you’re off duty.
Obviously travellers need to conceal some electronic device inside the skin of their bag (like they do with dogs) so that when you’re standing at the carousal waiting and waiting you can set off an alarm in your bag. That might give a potential thief a bit of a fright!
(Those boxes haven’t arrived yet, although I believe they should be here this Friday. Fortunately they didn’t arrive while we were in the middle of the chaos of putting down the carpet. )
I saw on a site discussing travel from the Cayman Islands the other day that the theft of baggage is huge even in that relatively small country. I must say we were fortunate in this respect, or perhaps, (as the writer of the article suggested) it was because none of our luggage looked like it was worth snaffling and investigating for potential goodies. The laptop travelled with us at all times, and apart from that we had very little else that was worth anyone stealing. Whoops, forgot my wife’s Ipod, which she wouldn’t have been impressed to have had filched. It also travelled as part of our hand luggage.
The writer of the article (which I’ve lost track of, otherwise I’d include the link) said that when people have brand new travel supplies they look as though they ought to contain something valuable, (the bags, not the passengers) and this entices the thieves.
The problem is that life is very easy for the airport thieves. Who’s keeping an eye on dishonest staff? In most major airports there are so many hiding places you could probably grab all the luggage from several flights and none of the other security personnel would notice. Stuff it all in one of the innumerable toilets for a while, put an ‘out of order’ sign on the door, and you can deal with it later when you’re off duty.
Obviously travellers need to conceal some electronic device inside the skin of their bag (like they do with dogs) so that when you’re standing at the carousal waiting and waiting you can set off an alarm in your bag. That might give a potential thief a bit of a fright!
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