Can a friend pick up my luggage from Helsinki Airport?

[justaguy]

I wish to take a detour in my flight plan. Instead of flying from London to Helsinki. I wish to fly on an alternate flight to Dublin for a week. However I want my rather large (25kg) bag to be picked up by a friend of mine at the airport so I don't have to haul it around with me in Dublin.

Is this possible? No matter what I try in google I cannot get a definitive answer for this.

So in laymen's terms.

I fly to London. Miss my flight to Helsinki. But my baggage goes on that flight and my friend picks it up for me.

Only issue I thought of us that in Helsinki the baggage carousels (as in all airports I think) are behind security doors which are only available to those who have departed from a landed plane. Not visitors to the airport.

Any ideas?

[AldenG]

Nowadays I believe that if you miss a boarding for which you've checked bags, they send a handler to remove your bags.

Actually I think they've done that more or less since Lockerbie, but gotten especially strict and high(er) tech about it since 9/11 and 7/7

[justaguy]

So even if I tell the airline that I won't be getting on my plane. They won't take my bags to Helsinki?

That's fair enough. I'll just take them with me to Dublin.

[riku2]

I fly to London. Miss my flight to Helsinki. But my baggage goes on that flight and my friend picks it up for me.

London is probably the worst place to try this and they will offload your bag for sure, they are far stricter about security than in Finland and no bag flies without the passenger also on the plane. They even had a boyfriend pack a woman's bag and she checked it in, not knowing he'd put a bomb inside it, so their security questions are much stricter.

Also when you don't take a flight that is part of your reservation, the rest of your booking is cancelled so if you have london-helsinki + helsinki-london on your booking and don't take the first flight, then the second (helsinki-london) is cancelled (even though you paid for the first flight but didn't take it).

Only issue I thought of us that in Helsinki the baggage carousels (as in all airports I think) are behind security doors which are only available to those who have departed from a landed plane. Not visitors to the airport.

Notionally this is true but thanks to their poor signage, many people landing go to the wrong baggage claim (the airport cannot make up its mind whether it's two terminals or one terminal and didn't sign the different baggage claims clearly for arriving passengers), so many people are landing, going to the wrong baggage claim and then going out/back into the other baggage claim. So nobody cares when you walk into the baggage claim from land-side even though there are signs saying it's not allowed. This would never be allowed in London either but there they know a bit more about signage. I've also gone back in when there are no luggage trolleys left at baggage claim (workers gone home before all flights land) and collected one from the taxi area and gone back to get my luggage (another lesson for the airport - don't partially shut down before all the days flights have arrived.. and i'm not talking about late arrivals either).

[harryc]

Your scenario is against all exisitng protocols and procedures - I don't think it was even EVER possible.

But these days, it certainly isn't permitted - it will work only with someone making a mistake

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Having said that - I often do wonder about those urgent PA calls one hears at terminals - "Will Mr. Adams please go to Boarding for Flight 6666 immediately - the Gate will be closing in 5 minutes"

I have - and everyone - has been hearing that kind of message by the dozen - if not 100's - over the last years.

Mr. Adams has surely missed some of those planes and HAD checked in baggage. For some Airbus 320/Boeing 767 etc. - how on earth do they find his baggage quickly among the hundreds of bags already loaded? Or is that the reason for some of the long delays?

[riku2]

For some Airbus 320/Boeing 767 etc. - how on earth do they find his baggage quickly among the hundreds of bags already loaded? Or is that the reason for some of the long delays?

the bags are not loaded individually but in metal containers holding about 30-40 bags each. There is a system to identify which container has a particular suitcase, so the baggage handlers only need check in one container. By the same method some airports want arriving containers to have the luggage for connecting flights/final destination already separated, so they don't' have to sort through ALL the luggage to find which suitcases will be put on a second flight.

[harryc]

Thanks for the Splanation.

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I was once about to leave on a flight from Las Vegas to Denver. It had originated in LA.

LA passengers could get out during the LV stopover - the plane re-boarded and there was someone missing - a passenger that had boarded in LA. We waited while he was paged and paged. Finally all the bags were unloaded onto the tarmac and we had to get out and identify our own. All bags were accounted for.

At the end of the process - they found the guy - he was playing the one arm bndits in the terminal - and was winning. WE had lost.

[Pursuivant]

So in laymen's terms.

I fly to London. Miss my flight to Helsinki. But my baggage goes on that flight and my friend picks it up for me.

Any ideas?

Yes, I know, those every-10-minutes chimes on unattended baggage are these days just elevator music...

You fly to London. Delay the flight to Helsinki when they panic and remove your bag. Your bag is taken to the secure area and one of the dogs pisses on it, but as they can't tell which dog it was, the bomb or drugs, as they start humping, its exploded just to be safe. The Dublin flight you are on is diverted to Belfast. You spend 25 days in Macberry trying to explain things. Your friend gets his flat raided and his cat escapes...

OK... Maybe I've been watching too many B-action movies, but thats about the classiest plot for smuggling dope or blowing up a flight from back in the last century.

So.. any idea except that. Depending on how you can cancel/not cancel/reschedule your flights you can still send your bag as "cargo" to Helsinki, and it might be possible to your friend to pick it up... Of course it will cost you more than hiring a private jet... You could just get a box big enough and mail it to yourself...

Other option is say "cheap from Helsinki" we know nothing is, so you look down south, Ryanair flies from Tallinn, Easyjet and AirBaltic from Riga... so getting to Dublin is possible. If its money, then Ryanair to London and a coach to Dublin is about £25 one way Victoria Coach - Busaras.

[Bavarian]

You fly to London. Delay the flight to Helsinki when they panic and remove your bag. Your bag is taken to the secure area and one of the dogs pisses on it, but as they can't tell which dog it was, the bomb or drugs, as they start humping,

More seriously, one or the other of the dogs is more likely to alert if the handler wants it. Dogs are very determined to please their masters.

[Pursuivant]

Its supposed to be comedy-action, don't foil my plot with facts