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Tales of airline passengers tracking their own lost bags are becoming ever more popular, as numbers of suitcases mishandled by airlines continue to spiral, and travelers invest in tracking devices.

But a passenger flying back to the airport where the tracker is showing, to collect it themselves when all official avenues fail? That’s a new one.

Sandra Shuster, from Denver, took matters into her own hands when her lost bag was showing as being at Chicago O’Hare airport – but her airline, United, was doing nothing about it.

Shuster and her 15-year-old daughter Ruby, who plays lacrosse, were flying back from Baltimore via Chicago on July 17, when their checked bag went missing.

The pair – who’d been to Baltimore for a tournament – had traveled with carry-on bags for their clothes, but had checked one bag containing Ruby’s lacrosse kit. When they arrived at Denver after midnight, the bag wasn’t on the belt. United representatives at Denver gave them a case number and told them the bag should arrive on the 8.30 a.m. flight from Chicago in just a few hours. When it didn’t, Shuster called the toll-free number for lost baggage that she’d been given.

“They said, ‘Your bag’s going to come in later today on one of two flights.’ I said ‘OK, great,’ but it never came. So I called later that afternoon and they said ‘Your bag is still in Baltimore,’” says Shuster.

There was just one problem: she already knew it wasn’t in Baltimore. Three months earlier, Shuster had bought an AirTag – Apple’s tracking devices – to know where her daughter’s bag was. “This is unique equipment, and we have to check it. Airlines are getting worse, rates of lost luggage are getting higher, and I wanted to know where it was – so I bought the tag,” she explains.

And the AirTag was showing as being at baggage reclaim at O’Hare.

“I told them I could see it at Terminal 1 baggage reclaim in Chicago, and they said ‘We have no record of it.’ I asked them to call Chicago, and they said ‘No, we’re not allowed.’ They said they’d put notes in the system and the baggage team would take care of it.”

When the bag still didn’t arrive, and Shuster called a third time, she was told “We have no idea where it is.”

They also told Shuster that she had the wrong claim number – impossible, she thought, because she still had the sticker that had been attached to her boarding pass. The other half was on the bag.

In fact, they were right – sort of. The claim number was indeed the same as the tag that had been attached to her bag – but the check-in agent had attached the wrong tag. This one was for another passenger, who was traveling from Baltimore to Chicago only. That meant the bag had been taken off the plane at O’Hare and sent straight to the reclaim belt, instead of being loaded onto the Denver flight.

Ruby plays goal in lacrosse, which meant there was kit totaling about $2,000 in that bag. Replacing it wasn’t just about the finances, says Shuster – a new stick needs to be restrung and then broken in, needing about a month in total. Meanwhile they were flying to San Francisco for another tournament in two days’ time. Ruby borrowed some kit for that trip.

Returning from California, they stopped at the lost luggage desk in Denver with their reference number, and reiterated that the AirTag was still tracking at Chicago.

“The guy said, ‘Mam, just because it’s at Chicago doesn’t mean it’s with your bag,’” says Shuster.

After suggesting someone had stolen the bag and dumped the AirTag, she says, the United representative told her that most people immediately put in claims to replace items, get $1,000-2,000 in compensation, and then have their bag arrive in a few weeks.

But Shuster was convinced it was still there. “It had moved maybe 50 feet, and the AirTag was embedded in the bag – I doubted someone stole it,” she says. “He was implying it could be a double win but I wasn’t trying to game the system – to replace what was in that bag was much harder.”

What’s more, her daughter had try-outs for the lacrosse team coming up the following week.

So when she asked a Chicago friend if there was any way he could swing by the airport, and realized he was on vacation himself, Shuster took matters into her own hands and booked a flight with air miles.

By this time, she’d made contact with United’s Twitter team, but been told they couldn’t locate it. She also says she called United three times, to be told first that they weren’t allowed to call through to the Chicago baggage office, then that a supervisor had authorized a call but nobody in Chicago was picking up – and finally, again, that calling Chicago was simply not allowed.

Before booking her flights – two hours each way, plus 30,000 air miles and around $30 in taxes – she told United’s Twitter account that she was planning the Chicago trip.

“We’ve let our baggage team in ORD know that you’ll be arriving,” they initially replied – before half an hour later messaging again to say, “We recommend that you remain in Denver while we continue to work through our processes to bring your bag back to you.”

By that point, Shuster didn’t trust much in United’s proc