A woman is demanding answers from American Airlines after she says she managed to track down her missing luggage to a Hollywood homeless encampment.
Aunny Grace said her travel nightmare began at Dallas Airport on May 29 when her flight was delayed.
“American Airlines left thousands of people stranded in the airport overnight for days, actually,” said Grace.
She then spent the night in Dallas Airport as she waited to board her flight home to Hollywood Burbank Airport, and was told that her luggage would be delayed.
However, she later discovered her luggage at a homeless encampment near the corner of Santa Monica Boulevard and Western Avenue, she said.
Grace was able to track her luggage down thanks to an Apple AirTag inside her suitcase, but now she wants to know how it ended up there.
“It went to Denver, then Denver back to Dallas, and then eventually, five days later, it made its way back to Burbank,” Grace told NBC4, adding that after five days, she was delivered the wrong suitcase.
She said she was initially told that her luggage was fine and that it had been delivered to her home in Hollywood, But her AirTag told a different story.
“When the carrier called me, he said he was at my house. I looked and I saw my AirTag twinkling down Western Avenue very slowly, like no direction, really,” Grace said. “I knew intuitively something was wrong. Something was way off.”
“Sometime between midnight and 7 a.m., my bag wound up in Homeless Town Hollywood,” she added.
Grace then decided to travel to the location of her AirTag where she found her luggage. But her nightmare wasn’t over yet.
When she found her suitcase, she discovered it had been opened and that everything had been taken out.
“I’m just crying, grabbing my stuff,” she said. “I had jewelry, medicine, bags I bought from Bali in Peru. My toiletry bag was flipped upside down, completely empty. Makeup bag, empty. This homeless man just ransacked through my stuff.”
Grace was able to retrieve her belongings after she and a friend paid the homeless man, she told NBC4. She has now filed a police report, and has also contacted American Airlines, who she said told her they would reimburse up to $1,700 for her items, well below what she says was worth more than $6,300.
As she was searching for her items, she noticed other bags as well.
“I saw suitcases with American Airline tags on them,” said Grace.
She added that the homeless man told her he had bought her suitcase down the street.
“I want to know: How did my suitcase go from the Burbank Airport to a homeless encampment in Hollywood on a corner of Western and Sunset?” said Grace.
She went on to explain that at the airport, some of the bags are out in the open, making it easy for anyone to grab them.
“The bags that are delayed, they remove them from the carousel line, and they bring them to the office. So you have the bags in the office, and then you have the rest of them are just outside,” she told NBC4.
Following the incident, American Airlines released a statement on Tuesday which read: “We strive to ensure that our customers’ checked luggage and other items arrive at their destinations on schedule and in their original condition. We are investigating what occurred here and, in the meantime, a member of our team is in contact with the customer to apologize and resolve the issue,” KABC reported.
But Grace says she is still not satisfied with the airline’s response.
“It’s going to keep happening until someone takes responsibility. This has to be placed on the responsibility of the airline,” said Grace.
The Independent has contacted American Airlines for comment.