Ever wonder where your bags go?

When you check your bags for a flight, do you ever wonder where they go?

After they are placed on the conveyor belt and vanish from sight, your luggage goes into a room where the TSA x-rays it and sometimes opens it up for a visual inspection.

From there, it goes here:

Welcome to the bagwell. In the upper right of the photo, you can see where the bags come down from the TSA screening room. After that they go on the conveyor that is simply a larger version of the one you see at the baggage claim area. As the bags go around, people check the location tags and place the bags into the correct carts that are lined up (you can see them in the left of the photo.

Carts for each flight have a clipboard where the bag count is logged. When it is time for departure, a Ramper simply hooks a tug up to the carts and drives them out to the aircraft for loading.

It sounds simple, but during the tourist season and holidays, this is one of the busiest places at the airport. These photos were taken at 0330 on a Monday. Not much action this time of the morning.

Here is another shot of one of the belts in the bagwell: