Ask the expert: Nick Gates

Question: How are baggage handling systems going to keep pace with the rapid increase in passenger numbers and flight frequencies?

Expert: Nick Gates, Baggage portfolio director for SITA

Over the last 10 years tracking and reconciliation systems have been introduced which make sure the correct bag is put on the correct flight. There has been a lot of additional technology, not just in the handling but also the peripheral things such as check in, loading bags onto the aircraft and processing viable bags. Now there are even services available to tell passengers their bag has arrived.

There was a trial between London, Dubai and Hong Kong with Emirates where they put RFID tags on the bags and as they came off the arrival belts they were able to send SMS messages to passengers saying their bags had arrived. RFID has been talked about for years and now it is really happening.

At the moment it's being installed in places like Amsterdam and Paris, Charles De Gaulle, but it's actually set to take over bar codes in the next 10 years.

This new introduction should make baggage handling systems more dependable. Barcodes are great; they are cheap and reliable, but if you put through 100 bags you can only get 80 or 90 of them, which isn't as good as RFID.

If you can't read the barcode on a bag once it's checked in it has to go through a sorting system to get it to the correct part of the airport. If they can't read the baggage tag then it has to be manually processed, going to a manual processing area where someone tries to use a handheld reader to scan the barcode or key in a piece of information.

If you can't read 20% of your bags, with 10,000 going through every hour, that's 2000 an area. You need several people doing this, which slows down the handling system and it can't handle 10,000 an hour.

It could mean the airport as it expands need to spend more on a new baggage handling system all because they are not optimising the use of the system. By making sure you can more efficiently read the baggage tag, you should be able to optimise the system and that's how RFID can help.

The industry in general is trying to reduce the amount of bags that get mishandled. There are various things that can be done such as better processing, staff training and more IT to better track the bags and where they are at any time. If a bag gets mishandled and left behind, implementing these measures will make it much easier to get it on the next flight.

There were several factors that led to the T5 disaster by all accounts. Staffing, security and timing all played a part. In fact there probably were half a dozen things that conspired to cause problems. There were challenges with the baggage handling system but I can't give specifics.

Hopefully these problems will be avoided at Dubai's T3 with plenty of practice. If you're expecting 100,000 passengers on the first day of operations you need to find 100,000 passengers to work with during trials. Basically you need to create the real world to practice with. Lots of airports do trials and encourage people to come along.

I took part in the T5 trials and they did a fantastic job, but a trial is a trial. If you don't test things at full capacity you can't really know how they will work. There was no indication at T5 that there would be any problems. It was fine, absolutely fine.

I think there is lots of demand in the Middle East to have the best and latest systems. Dubai has been carrying out RFID work and we have been involved in talks with airports about introducing RFID. SITA itself isn't an RFID supplier but often we have to integrate our systems, so we have had discussions.

You will see more adoption of it in the Mid-East. I can't mention names at the moment but we have been talking with airports and vendors in that region. It's down to them to decide when they want to bring this in.

The airport may be responsible for buying the infrastructure or getting the handling system upgraded, so they will have to spend money. But the airlines will also have to spend money, as it's usually their responsibility.

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