How My Two Cell Phones Were Lost In An Airplane... And Miraculously Found!

Air travel, with its tight schedules and stressful moments, is often a perfect catalyst for forgetting small objects like cell phones. Add to this my natural tendency to be absent minded and the fact that I used a sleeping pill on a night flight back from CTIA Wireless in Las Vegas last April and you have a perfect recipe: I forgot the two cell phones I was carrying in the pouch in front of my seat.

And it wasn't easy getting them back. Oh no it wasn't...

I filed a lost item report on the airline's web site. No news. I called the airline's office at the landing airport. Not found. After making about 10 unsuccessful calls, I gave up, thinking my two cell phones would end their lives at the back of a warehouse somewhere in North Carolina. But that was without counting on the determination of Sol, a U.S. Airways employee at the Miami airport. She went the extra mile for me, going as far as charging back my phones to look up the call logs and, from call to call, I got a call from her two weeks ago. She had found my phones. Thank you Sol!

If you are among the thousands of people who forget things, including many cell phones, on airplanes, here is what to do first:
- Call your phone four to five times per day. As long as the battery remains charged, someone may hear it ringing and answer!
- Don't limit yourself to filling a lost item report with the airline. Call their office at the airport where you landed; call their national lost and found warehouse.
- And call again and fill another report two weeks and a month later. If your phone wasn't found the day you lost it, it may be picked up weeks later as they do a through cleanup of the aircraft.

That said, the best way to find a lost cell phone is still to never lose it: If you are on an Aircraft, don't put personal belongings in the pouch in front of your seat. Especially if you are absent-minded.