An alarming email from Florida came with a picture of a soft, monkey-shaped toy. Rick Krueger, the deputy head of the airport's Lost-Found Office, says a child has forgotten it at the Frankfurt airport and misses it. Krueger confirms that the monkey is on a shelf waiting for the reunion.
Nearly 22,000 properties end at the Lost-Found Office each year. This figure is not surprising at Frankfurt Airport, which served more than 5.d64 million passengers last year, and as one of the most important air navigation hubs in the world and the fourth most active airport in Europe, according to German news agency (DPA).
Some of the missing items were found in passenger halls, and others were confiscated during security checks. They include all kinds of items: favorite toys, kitchen utensils, expensive watches, and electronic cigarettes.
While there are some items that are frequently lost such as jackets, the shelves feature a range of bizarre items.
For instance, Krueger says they once found a folded wheelchair, which is hard to forget. "Some travelers seem to have learned to walk here again," she says jokingly, adding that she has stopped weaving fairytales to explain why passengers forget such items.
"After a while, you do not keep asking yourself: Why?” she added. There are passengers who fill their bags with apples, and there is the stubborn person who does everything he needs with his hands and insists on taking his tools with him on holiday.
"The saws are classic," says Krueger. "We find many of them, especially in the summer." She indicates that they aren’t stored on the open shelves in the Lost-Found Office, but in a special closet dedicated for dangerous items in another room. "The lockers are automatically closed if anything goes on fire," Krueger said.
In general, owners of lost or confiscated items have 3 months to return them, unless they are perishable, such as foodstuffs, which will be disposed of immediately.
"If there is something to identify, such as a title card in a bag, we contact the owner of the items ourselves," she says.
After three months, very personal belongings would be automatically disposed of.
"We once had a wedding album (among the missing stuffs)," Krueger said. "Your heart bleeds when you have to get rid of something like that."
As per the items that no one asks for, they would be sold in the city of Darmstadt near the airport in up to 8 auctions annually. "Generally, all the auctioned items are sold" says Birgit Windt, head of the auction office.
"Contrary to what many believe, technical devices are not the most attractive items ... many of these products are closed for insurance, so they serve only as a source of spare parts," says Windt, who has kept auction records for 30 years. Designer materials are usually more popular, especially among bargain enthusiasts, she adds.
She says there are occasional exceptions that may be kept for more than three months.
"If things are of great value, we keep them for up to six months." But the items’ owners would have to pay for the longer reserve of their items.
The more valuable the object, and the longer the storage period are, higher fees should be paid. There is also a reward for those who found something.
"Because our legal status is a public transport company, whoever finds something should be rewarded, but not with the item itself," Krueger says. As for the small monkey doll, it has a long journey; it will be shipped to its owner in the United States.
