Teen fined by airline over ridiculous clothing baggage hack
This “runway” attire wasn’t going to fly.
Another day, another traveler with a bold new way to game the luggage fine system. An Australian teen was slapped with a fine after attempting to circumvent an airline baggage fee — by donning more than 13 pounds of clothing, as seen in a video blowing up online.
“I looked like a bear. I’m small and petite but I looked like the exact opposite,” Adriana Ocampo, 19, told South West News Service of her backfired travel hack, which she attempted to pull during a Jetstar Airways flight from Melbourne to her hometown of Adelaide.
The teen, who had just been on a girls’ trip with pal Emily Altamura, also 19, said she knew her luggage was over the airline’s 15-pound limit after she could “barely close” her bag in the hotel room.
Nonetheless, the duo schlepped their oversize load to the airport in the hopes that the crew wouldn’t have time to check — which proved not to be the case.
“When we went to board, we saw them pulling out a trolley with a scale,” rued Ocampo.
That’s when she got an unorthodox idea.
“We thought the only way we can take the weight off our bags is if we put it on ourselves so we started putting on our jackets and coats,” said the gal, who was forced to do this routine a second time because her bag was still over the limit.
In the aforementioned footage, the Aussie can be seen laughing hysterically as she yanks all her clothing out of the suitcase and dons it until she’s wearing 15 different things, including an iPad stuffed in her pants.
Her friend, meanwhile, follows suit, until the two resemble Ralphie’s jacket-swaddled little brother from “A Christmas Story.”
“As well as layers of jackets and jumpers, I had baggy trousers on and I was stuffing t-shirts and my iPad in them,” described the human garment rack. “I had about six layers on and stuff in my pockets.”
By the end, her luggage only had two pairs of shoes, a bag, a pair of jeans and a couple of socks.
“I was hysterical, I was laughing so much,” exclaimed Ocampo, who compared her appearance to the candy-grubbing Augustus Gloop from “Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory.”
Despite their commitment to the hack, it ultimately didn’t fly, as the airline told them they still had to pay the $65 fine.
“Everyone in line was staring at us and laughing at us, it was kind of embarrassing,” lamented the traveler. “People were annoyed that we were holding the plane up.”
If that wasn’t humiliating enough, the two bozos were forced to endure the 80-minute flight cocooned in clothing like an attack dog trainer, as seen in the aforementioned footage.
“This is how I’m going on the flight,” Ocampo said ahead of boarding. “I’m in tears.”
Jetstar Airways has since addressed the inflight fashion disaster in a statement.
“While we certainly see the funny side, we have limits to carry-on to make it fair for everyone,” said an airline spokesperson. “Keeping track of how much baggage passengers bring onboard means everyone has room for their belongings and we’re meeting our safety requirements.”
This comes amid a surge in travelers MacGyvering new and often ludicrous ways to smuggle their excess baggage through security.
In March, a female plane passenger divided the internet after trying to camouflage multiple bags with her jacket to avoid having to check them.
The year before, a woman revealed how she bypassed baggage fees by smuggling clothing in a hollowed-out neck pillow.
In a similar story to Ocampo’s, in 2019, a Filipino airline passenger donned 5 extra pounds of clothes to avoid paying a penalty.
