Holidaymaker left ‘frantic’ without prosthetic leg after airline loses luggage

A traveller was left without her waterproof prosthetic leg for her entire holiday after an airline lost the bag she packed it into.

Emily Tuite, 26, spent her trip to California without the custom-made medical limb that she needed for beach activities and standing up in the shower.

On 1 September, she checked in her bag with Allegiant Air at the airport in Austin, Texas.

But upon landing in San Diego, she was told that the suitcase with the prosthetic leg inside had gone missing.

Ms Tuite said that she spent almost the whole of her eight-day holiday stressed and trying to get in touch with the airline in hopes of having her luggage quickly returned to her.

A representative of Allegiant had told her that the bag didn’t make it on the flight to San Diego.

Ms Tuite feared that the blue suitcase might have been stolen at the airport as she had received a tracking number for the bag when she checked it in.

It was not until almost a fortnight later on 12 September – several days after her holiday was over – that she was reunited with her bag and prosthetic limb.

She told news station Austin KXAN: “I couldn’t believe that it took 12 days to get my medical device back.

“I was like ‘I need to do everything in my power to get the bag back somehow’, so, yeah, I did a lot to get there.”

Ms Tuite told the Mail that her experience of dealing with Allegiant was “traumatic”, claiming that airline staff kept breaking their promise to call her back and that it was “near impossible” to contact them.

She received a call from the carrier saying her bag had been found in Provo, Utah, and had been tagged with another passenger’s information by mistake.

Ms Tuite said: “So they were calling that person saying, ‘We have your bag,’ and that person was saying, ‘It’s not mine.’

“Meanwhile, I’m frantic, panicked, thinking that my items are gone, like just stolen from the airport, so I really learned a lesson for sure about flying and tracking your stuff.”

She said she is considering carrying the prosthetic leg in her hand luggage in future or packing it into checked luggage but tagging it with a tracker so that she can locate it if her bag goes missing again.

It can take more than one year to make a bespoke prosthetic leg and there are often medical insurance issues to navigate when getting the device remade, Ms Tuite explained.

She asked the airline to refund the cost of her flight, which she said they declined.

The Independent has contacted Allegiant Air for comment.

An Allegiant spokesperson reportedly said the airline gave Ms Tuite a refund of $60 (about £50) to cover her baggage fees.

They added: “In addition, we kindly asked Ms Tuite to submit receipts for compensation and processing.”