Images have been shared from Edinburgh Airport that show a huge backlog of unclaimed luggage that was reportedly left by passengers who were unable to wait any longer.
A number of flights from different airlines all arrived in the capital at small intervals during the early hours of Monday, July 11, with passengers having to wait "hours" for their luggage to be put onto the belt.
Images captured by one fed up flyer, Martin Stevely, shared a video that showed a sea of unclaimed luggage at the airport. He said dozens of families with young children couldn't stand around waiting any longer, so just left their bags until they could come back another time.
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Martin, from Fife, and his friends were travelling from Tenerife with Ryanair, arriving at 9.30pm. Several hours later, the luggage from his flight was finally loaded onto the carousel. He said that the bags from four other flights were all loaded onto the same one, with his arriving hours after the flight landed.
Although Martin was frustrated by the lack of support and guidance from staff, he did note that Jet2 were doing their best to help people find their bags. Edinburgh Airport explained that they are offering passengers advice on which handling agent to contact if such an issue arises again, as the they only provide such facilities for handling agents to use, this information can be found on their website, or via this link.
He said: "I took a video which shows all the bags abandoned by people that couldn't wait for them to come through. They were using two carousels but only one flight on carousel two and five flights on carousel one which led to chaos.
"We were flying from Tenerife but only the bags from the later easyJet flight pictured and some random Charles De Gaulle bags were constantly going round and round unclaimed. The Tenerife bags didn't start coming through until around 12:30am which was hours after the flight.
"Bags were also coming through on the ring carousels too with no guidance from the airport that this was happening. I had to help out other family's myself to help identify bags. There weren't any representatives from any of the airlines or even the airport to assist customers. The only presence was from Jet2 who were doing their best but couldn't help us as we were flying with Ryanair.
"The rep did refer us to the Swissport and airport management but neither were anywhere to be seen. It looks like this chaos will continue through the summer which is a real shame."
Martin added that people were fed up with waiting so just abandoned their bags. He said there were young families with kids screaming and crying given the extreme heat on Sunday so he could see why they just wanted to get home, especially as it was past midnight.
Martin was also travelling with some friends and their kids who were getting a bit inpatient but dealt with the delays anyway, but admitted he felt sorry for those who were forced to wait around for their luggage.
A spokesperson for Edinburgh Airport said: "We know this is a frustrating experience for passengers and we are working to support airlines and their handling agents in improving the process. We know airlines and handling agents are working hard to reunite passengers with unclaimed baggage, but this is being impacted by a lack of airline ground handling staff due to recruitment challenges.
"We continue to work closely with partners and provide support where and when possible. We are now providing passengers with information on which handling agent they need to speak to, and how to contact them, if they have a baggage query. This can be found on our website."
Swissport, who are responsible for Jet2's Ryanair's and Air France' baggage, commented: "Summer months are always exceptionally busy, and the aviation sector is under increasing pressure at the moment. With high volumes of off-schedule luggage arriving daily at Edinburgh, we’ve brought in additional resource to support the team. We understand this is a really frustrating situation for passengers and we’re working closely with our airline and airport partners to securely process these bags as fast as we can."
WFS, who handle easyJet's baggage, have also been contacted for comment.
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