Never Lose Luggage Again

Perform a Google search on "lost luggage complaint" and it returns a list of horror stories to chill even the heartiest frequent flier. At a time when fuller flights and heightened security means more luggage is being checked -- and lost -- than ever before, some airlines and airports are hoping that radio frequency identification, or RFID, will dig them out from under a mountain of misrouted bags.

Baggage checked at large airports today is shunted into a system of conveyer belts, switches and ramps designed to move luggage quickly to the proper plane. The system's key -- and its Achilles' heel -- is the luggage tag attached to each checked bag, printed with passenger data and flight information, as well as a bar code and 10-digit identifier. Laser scanners read each bar code as it passes, guiding luggage through the system and sending data on each bag's location to a central database so missing luggage can be traced.

But the readers don't always work. A scanner can only pick up bar codes that pass directly in front of its laser; wet, folded or smudged tags are often unreadable, and scanners perform especially poorly when exposed to dirt or dust. "Think about how often you see the supermarket cashier cleaning his scanner so that it actually works," says Mike Saunders, manager of aviation for Symbol Technologies, a maker of RFID equipment. "It's the same technology, and trust me -- your average supermarket is much cleaner than an airport basement."

As a result, read rates for new bar code scanners rarely top 90 percent, and quickly drop below 85 percent as equipment ages and becomes dirty. This leaves airlines and airports with thousands of bags to sort manually each day, increasing the chance that luggage will be misrouted or lost. Last year, there were 3.5 million baggage-related complaints, a number likely to be exceeded this year.

Enter RFID, an electronic identification system that relies on tiny transponders, or tags, to store and retrieve data. It's not new technology: Passive tags, which require no external power source, can be found implanted under the skin of endangered animals, embedded into subway fare cards, and slapped on the inventory of retailers like Wal-Mart to help manage their massive supply chains.

Applying disposable transponders to bags or luggage tags would eliminate many of the problems inherent in bar-code-based systems. Utilizing radio waves instead of lasers, RFID doesn't require a direct line of sight between the reader and tag, and isn't affected by dirt or dust. RFID tags are generally more weather-resistant than paper labels, and the hardware is compatible with most existing baggage systems. Most importantly, RFID boasts a read rate that exceeds 99 percent, which means airlines would spend less time and money reuniting lost bags with their rightful owners, a process The International Air Transport Association, or IATA, estimates costs the industry $2.5 billion a year.

So why haven't airlines embraced the technology? For the same reason you can't get a pillow or a sandwich on most flights: money. RFID tags cost 10 to 20 cents each, versus 2 to 3 cents for a printed label. Fifteen extra cents per bag might not seem like much, but for an outfit like Delta Air Lines, which carried 78 million domestic passengers last year, it adds up.

But a handful of airlines and airports believe the benefits outweigh the costs, and have moved ahead with the technology. McCarran International Airport in Las Vegas recently rolled out a baggage management system that uses RFID to handle the 70,000 bags that pass through the airport each day. "A bar code system with a 90 percent read rate means I'm manually processing 7,000 bags a day," explains Samuel Ingalls, the airport's information systems director. "With a read rate over 99 percent, RFID puts me in a much more manageable situation."