Australian YouTuber Shane Miller found himself without his bag full of equipment (worth more than $4,500) after he flew in to Melbourne Airport on Singapore Airlines. Airport official told the guy that the luggage is somewhere around the world, having missed the connecting flight.
After a couple of days, Miller’s AirTag reported that it had entered the country. Funnily enough, the company operating the luggage service failed to call the guy and say “your bag has arrived.” Miller tried to go through official channels and called the company (16 times all going to voicemail with no callback).
The company responsible for the mishap has also a website for lost luggage – but Miller’s bag wasn’t listed there either. After one week of waiting and nail biting, Miller just drove to the airport and used the Find My feature to track his bag.
“Long story short, the guy at oversized baggage really, really helped out on where I needed to go to get the bag,” says Miller. “Then the last mile, so to speak, was all 100% the AirTag.”
“The office staff were very helpful, taking me to the correct office,” he continued. “And I was able to tell I was within a few meters of the bag, and when I was around the corner from where the bag was dumped on one of their office floors, I could make it start beeping.”
There’s a half hour long YouTube video of the whole endeavor but the gist of it is that without the AirTags the man probably would never have found his luggage. Miller is a cyclist who also reviews GPS navigation gadgets, trackers, and other sports equipment.
Apple AirTags success stories so far
This isn’t the first time AirTags helped humans find their stuff. Back in January, a double car theft was interrupted by an AirTag in Texas. Earlier this month, Apple’s AirTag helped the police find a stolen backpack and arrest the alleged thief. Another Australian – Graham Tait, a Sydney resident and photographer, used AirTags to recover $7,000 worth of stolen equipment.
On the other hand, there are an equal number of horror stories surrounding this gadget. The intrinsic nature of the AirTags means that this tracker can be used to… track things – including people who don’t want to be tracked. Apple has acknowledged the issue publicly and issued a slew of anti-tracking measures but the gadget’s reputation remains ambivalent.
