EVERYTHING including the kitchen sink was found lying around Heathrow’s four terminals last year.
The 58m passengers who used the world’s busiest international airport left some weird and wonderful items in departure lounges.
Certainly the oddest things among the 73,000 items misplaced were the two kitchen sinks.
Backchat asks what were they doing there? We know people like to take most of their possessions on trips, but kitchen facilities seems a bit extreme.
Next in oddness comes a bus stop.
Surely this is best left on one of Heathrow’s busy streets, or is BAA planning to improve public transport links so much that bus stops are introduced at check-in desks?
Also found were a false leg and the front part of a Ford Escort. Mundane really.
Lost property staff also dealt with highly valuable items – such as a load of gold bars. So that’s where our New Year bonus got to!
Compared to 1994, the 1998 haul was a bit disappointing.
Five years ago people were leaving glass eyes, boat sails, canoes, a briefcase containing ú37,000, a disabled toilet and a suitcase full of dead fish.
Fancy that, taking dead fish on holiday – maybe it was a penguin on a break.
The most common lost items are still the old favourites of umbrellas, cameras and mobile phones – 20 mobiles a day are handed in to staff.
On the other side of London, Stansted also gets its share of lost property, although it tends to be edible.
Over Christmas 1997 someone must have gone without their turkey, as a 20lb bird was found in the car park.
And this Yuletide another person (or maybe the same one) left a whole fresh salmon for staff to deal with.