printer friendly version

Baggage handling

Radio-tagged luggage system may be implemented globally.

A high-tech baggage-tagging system, already in use in Las Vegas and Hong Kong, is showing promise for reducing lost airline baggage. In June, the International Air Transport Association, which sets standards for airlines, is set to vote on whether to mandate a phase-in of radio-frequency ID baggage tags.

The tags, which transmit a bag's identifying number much like a toll-road pass, reduce lost luggage by approximately 20%, according to industry estimates. They improve accuracy of baggage sorting, making sure more bags get on the right aeroplane. They can also be used by airlines to track the location of delayed baggage.

Barry Baetu, managing director of Harmonic Group, a South African supplier of auto-identification equipment, thinks the new technology could yield a quick improvement in airline baggage woes. As reports of baggage theft at Johannesburg's OR Tambo International Airport escalate, Baetu says RFID has the potential to reverse the trend and ultimately save money for airlines.

Last year, US airlines spent an estimated $400 million on lost luggage - money that went to reimburse passengers and deliver late bags to hotels and homes.

This is how the RFID system works: when a bag is checked at an airline ticket counter, it gets a normal-looking baggage tag embedded with an RFID chip. As the bag goes along conveyor belts, it passes through curtained stations where receivers read the bag's identification and route it to security screening, then to a drop point for the airline. From there, bags are loaded onto carts and driven out to the aeroplanes.

The system is 99% accurate in reading tags, a significant improvement over the 80 to 90% accuracy that airports get with bar-coded tags read by optical scanners. "Scanners often cannot read barcode tags if the tag gets twisted or covered up or it was smudged when printed because the printer had not been cleaned recently," Baetu explains. "So these bags get dumped into an 'unknown' pile and have to be manually sorted, often missing their flights."

Las Vegas McCarran International Airport handles more than 70 000 outbound bags a day, so 7000 bags or more had to be manually sorted when bar-coded tags were used. RFID has reduced that to only about 700 bags a day. (Case study from Wall Street Journal).

Share this article:

Further reading: