hazelrah

After a long hiatus from USairways, I recently took a trip on USAirways from DCA to Florida. Overall, the experience was positive. Aircraft at both ends were on time, service in First was reasonable, checked bag collection in Florida was prompt ~ no longer than 20 minutes.

Flew into DCA yesterday (Easter) and the checked luggage was a different story - a bit of a madhouse. At the DCA belts, large crowds; a baggage handler emerged and shouted at the crowd that he had to remove luggage from the belt as there was not room on the belt for additional luggage.

He then proceeded to remove luggage fom the belt and place it in the general waiting area. One person made a comment to the the baggage handler that I did not over hear, but I guess he did not like it.

We then had to endure a 20 minute delay and every baggage piece that emerged was flipped over wrong side down and with the tags obscured. Overall about 55 minutes to collect checked bags, this on a 1 hour 55 minute flight!

Sierra

I had the very same experience earlier this year (passengers told they have to remove bags from the belt). Generally, find that US baggage claim at DCA is a zoo. Just a little direction and information from the attendants would help calm nerves, but no effort is given. Seems that US has too few baggage persons at DCA, esp. if flights arrive late in the evening.

fltsrgn

Had a similarly disappointing experience at DCA during meltdown #2 (about a week after the SHARES migration). A single bag needed to make it from gate 35 (express gates) across the concourse to gate 36 but failed to do so in about 90 minutes. This was in spite of the fact that the final leg was delayed so "they could load more bags" and the aircraft door was reopened no fewer than twice to let on 1 or 2 additional late arriving passengers. Only have to wonder that all of the extra bags were being sent to CLT to have that hub sort it all out (as they have proven able to do). Tremendous confusion in final destination CLT owing to the massive # of misconnect bags/passsengers resulting in a line well over an hour long to simply file a missing bag report.

MJonTravel

Last year, I don't recall more than one wait under 45 minutes upon arrival at DCA when flying US. Many times it was closer to an hour. This was throughout the year, on mainline and Express. Other cities were much better at this. I had the bags beat me to the claim area in FLL for example.

Not sure why DCA has been so bad. Other airlines at DCA have been much better in my experience, which leads me to believe that it is a US at DCA problem.

hazelrah

I've flown out of DCA on NW and YX with checked bags, no problem. It seems unique to USairways.