Three separate organizations hold lost property at Cyril E. King Airport, and none of them can search the other two. Work out where the item was left before making the first call, because the wrong office cannot redirect you.
Anything left on the aircraft belongs to the airline. Anything left in the terminal goes to the Virgin Islands Port Authority. Anything left at the security checkpoint stays with TSA.
Which Office Holds Your Item
On the aircraft
Cabin crew collect items from seat pockets, overhead bins and under seats, and hand them to the airline rather than to the airport. Contact the carrier directly. Contact details are on the airlines.
If you notice before leaving the building, go straight to your airline’s desk in the baggage claim area. The item may not have come off the aircraft yet, and recovery on the day is far more likely than recovery a week later.
Checked baggage that is missing or damaged runs on a different process with its own deadlines, set out on the baggage claim.
In the terminal
Departure lounges, seating areas, restrooms and the concourse are the Port Authority’s responsibility, which covers most of the building.
Shops, restaurants and bars frequently hold items themselves for a day or two before passing them on. If you know where you were sitting, ask the outlet before anyone else. The restaurants lists what operates in the terminal.
At the security checkpoint
Items forgotten at screening stay with TSA rather than the airport. TSA runs a separate lost and found for each airport and publishes the contact route in its own directory. At many airports TSA passes the day’s items to the airport lost and found at close of business, so if TSA has no record, ask the Port Authority as well.
Items surrendered at screening, as opposed to forgotten, are not returned at all. Those count as abandoned property and are disposed of.
The Thirty Day Clock
TSA holds checkpoint items for a minimum of thirty days. After that they are destroyed, transferred to a state surplus agency, or sold as excess property. Identification is treated more harshly than anything else. A driver’s license or passport left at a checkpoint and unclaimed after thirty days is destroyed rather than stored.
Electronics are wiped or destroyed rather than passed on with data intact, so a laptop recovered late may come back with an empty drive. File on the day you notice. Around one in ten items left at checkpoints nationally is ever claimed, and most of that failure is delay rather than the item disappearing.
What to Put in the Report
Descriptions are matched by hand against shelves of similar objects, so specificity decides the outcome.
Give the brand, model and color. Give the serial number for a phone, laptop or camera. Give whatever separates the item from a hundred like it: the case, a sticker, a scratch, an engraving.
State the date, and the place and time as precisely as you can manage. Add the flight number and the gate.
Leave a phone number and an email address that work while you are travelling, not a home line you will not reach for a week. Check flight info if you need to pin down the timing of your own departure.
Recovery itself is free. Shipping is not. If the item has to be sent on to another island or to the mainland, the cost falls to you.
Airport Contacts
Virgin Islands Port Authority: +1 340 774-5100
Airport information: +1 340 774-1629
Security checkpoint items: use the TSA lost and found directory and select this airport.
Airline items: see the airlines for carrier contact details.
Property lost or damaged during screening itself, rather than simply forgotten, goes through a separate TSA claims process. Allow up to six months for a claim to be investigated.
Frequently Asked Questions
TSA holds items left at the security checkpoint for a minimum of thirty days before disposing of them. The Virgin Islands Port Authority does not publish a fixed retention period for items found elsewhere in the terminal, and airlines set their own. File the report on the day you notice rather than relying on any of them.
Contact TSA rather than the airport. TSA maintains a separate lost and found at each airport and lists the contact route in its online directory. If TSA has no record, ask the Virgin Islands Port Authority as well, because at many airports TSA hands the day’s items to the airport at close of business.
It is destroyed if unclaimed after thirty days. TSA does not store identification documents beyond that period, and does not return them once destroyed. A driver’s license or passport left at screening is therefore the most time-critical item on this list, because replacing one takes considerably longer than replacing a jacket.
It is destroyed if unclaimed after thirty days. TSA does not store identification documents beyond that period, and does not return them once destroyed. A driver’s license or passport left at screening is therefore the most time-critical item on this list, because replacing one takes considerably longer than replacing a jacket.