Does priority luggage ever work?

[Decker]

and this is why we all love V-Flyer - knowledgeable people who are prepared to share that knowledge! Thanks Biggles!

'Honey Lamb',

for a passenger/bag coming from somewhere else into Heathrow, and then outwards on Virgin, at Heathrow their bag is placed into a bin marked 'interline' irregardless of what class it is. This is loaded into the aircraft 'almost last', so that it comes off quite quickly at the other end. That bin will probably contain bags for all classes.

Golf clubs are considered to be 'outsize items'. At Heathrow they usually manage to get them into the baggage bins. If they belong to a 'UC' or 'PE' passenger they almost always go into the relevant baggage bin (see my explanation earlier). I cannot recollect manually loading too many bags of golf clubs onto VA flights (becuase they're in the bins) but it does happen. It is better to put 3 suitcases into a baggage bin rather than one set of golf clubs.

For flights into Heathrow, the handling of golf clubs at the other end varies greatly. Sometimes they are in the bins and sometimes they are loaded into the bulk hold. They explains why you get them at different times. I can recollect seeing a bin continaing _just_ golf clubs - about 20 bags, of all classes.



To Howard Long ... all Virgin flight use 'containerised baggage' (as you call it) - 'baggage bins' as we know it. You check them in, they go down the conveyor belt, they get loaded into baggage bins (approx 50 per bin), the bin is delieverd to the aircraft, and we shove the bin into the hold. Simple really. Some bags and items are delivered to the aircraft in an open trailer - these get put into the bulk hold at the bag of the aircraft.


To Lipstick - not true, approx 5% max of bags are manually loaded, everything else is in bins and the whole bin is loaded. Everything is 100% accounted for, and we *will* delay an aircraft if we can't account for everything.



This is how it works at Heathrow, Gatwick and Manchester are different, so I can't comment.

Thanks for the insight Biggles. I for one find it facinating to know how it all works behind the scenes.
I mentioned on a previous thread that there is a Discovery Channel program about the workings of Chicago O'Hare. The part about the baggage system on that program was really interesting.

Cheers Biggles for the post-

The two baggage belts seems to be very much a LGW North Termianl thing. It happened to me recently coming back from TPA via ATL on Delta.

From looking at the bags, and seeing that my bags were the first off- it seems that in the north terminal they are trying to create belts for just First/Business class pax and a belt for Y. the system isnt really working because interlined bags are coming off on hte First/Business belt before the first bags (prob due to being first bin off etc) and they arent telling anyone that one belt is for First and other for Y.