Believe it or Don’t!

Sometimes you run across a news story so absurd that you hesitate to post about it, just because you worry that people will think you are making it up. This is why, for example, I never did anything with the tale of the giant (25-meter) rubber ducky that got loose on a Dutch canal and ended up blocking traffic when it got wedged into the span of a nearby motorway bridge. Despite being an excellent example of a publicity stunt gone horribly, horribly wrong (a lesson on the importance of good operational planning as well as the critical need to avoid annoying potential customers), I was too concerned that everyone would think the pictures were created in Photoshop and the story was made up. I also failed to report the truck accident that spilled 10,000 gallons of Miracle Whip onto Interstate 80 on the same day that another truck on the same road overturned and spilled 30,000 pounds of corned beef. But frankly, even you can believe that those things happened, I still wouldn’t blame you if you refused to accept that United Airlines lost Dave Carroll’s luggage this week…

For those who don’t remember him, Carroll is the musician who witnessed his $3,500 guitar being hurled (and broken) by United’s baggage handlers, only to have the airline refuse to pay for the repairs to the instrument or make any effort to compensate him for his time a trouble until he created a song about the episode and posted the video of it on You Tube. I wrote about the original situation last July after it happened in a post about customer service and stupidity. Today, however, the CBC online is reporting that Carroll was on his way to Denver last Sunday to give a keynote speech about customer service, and had to fly United as they were the only carrier that had a flight going where he needed to go, when he needed to go there. Carroll arrived without incident Sunday night; his luggage did not turn up until Wednesday evening…

Now, I don’t really want to rag on the airline; when you are moving several million pieces of luggage each day, you’re occasionally going to have one end up someplace it wasn’t supposed to go. It just seems incredible that it would take them four days to find a bag again, having lost it in the first place – let alone that they would engage in the farcical behavior described in the news story, where they gave contradictory instructions to the passenger whose property they had, once again, placed at risk. Even leaving aside the fact that you would expect them to keep an eye out for Dave Carroll and try to keep from providing him with any additional career-enhancing material, it’s amazing that the airline would have completely violated Department of Homeland Security regulations that require every bag to travel on the same aircraft as its owner – or been unable to just load and unload the bag if they didn’t…

The long-term effects of this story remain to be seen. Certainly, it’s not a good thing for United Airlines; unlike the original episode, which seems to have brought them only ridicule and discomfort, this one could actually end up bringing them Federal investigations, sanctions and fines. If those investigations actually turn up some half-baked attempt on someone’s part to “get back at” Dave Carroll, it could bring the airline criminal charges, huge liability lawsuits, and an absurd amount of lost business. I normally discourage people from believing everything they see on the Internet, but in this case I have to believe that it’s a story too absurd for anyone to have made up. Believe it, or don’t, as you see fit…