A mum has channeled her inner detective to track down her four-year-old daughter’s lost teddy bear – after it was left on an EasyJet flight.
Chelsey Peters was determined to find her daughter’s toy, Toby, after he was left behind on a recent family trip.
The beloved bear has been with little Alice since she was a baby in 2018, so the mum-of-two knew how important he was to her.
In preparation for their travels from their home in Trinity, Jersey, to London Luton airport, Chelsey attached an AirTag to the black teddy bear – just in case he was misplaced.
And soon after, her worst fear came true when she put Alice to bed that night at her grandma’s house in the UK and discovered that Toby was missing.
While most parents may have admitted defeat and begun to search for a replacement, Chelsey was on a mission to reunite her daughter with the cuddly toy.
She started her search by emailing staff members at Luton’s lost property department and closely followed Toby’s AirTag location, which showed that he was still in the airport.
Chelsey said: ‘Toby is Alice’s best friend and goes everywhere with her.
‘She chews on his eye and always wants him if she’s upset or has hurt herself.
‘After we landed, it was a rush and faff getting the hire car, so we didn’t notice Toby was missing until Alice went to bed at grandma’s house.
‘When Alice woke up on Friday morning, she was devastated he wasn’t there.
‘Grandma is Alice’s favourite person, and we hadn’t seen her since August, so she was appeased initially but kept missing him.’
The Peters family, including Chelsey, her two children (Alice and Oliver) and her husband Daniel, were flying from their home in Jersey to London Luton airport on October 27 to attend a wedding and visit family in Kent.
A video of Alice on the Easyjet flight shows her playing with Toby in her seat as the plane prepared to land.
Chelsey admitted that she naively thought they would be able to go to lost property before their return flight and retrieve Toby – but the process turned out to be a lot more complicated.
They arrived at the airport three hours early so they could go and find the teddy, but he could not be located in time and they had to leave him behind.
Chelsey hastily took to Twitter to reach anyone who could help, saying: ‘Our daughter left her favourite comforter, Toby, on flight EZY2312 Jersey to Luton on Thursday October 27.
‘We have called every number and spent hours at the check-in desk trying to find him. He has an AirTag, and we can see he’s been stored at Luton. Please help return him.
And she added: ‘Please help return him to a very sad four-year-old. He’s been missing six days now.’
She then began to track down company employees, including staff from Menzies Aviation, the handling agent for EasyJet at Luton.
‘We kept emailing Menzies to find him but were getting no response.
‘I then Googled Menzies Aviation and found the email address for the site manager at Luton.
‘I forwarded our emails to him and got an “out of office” saying he’d left the company.
‘Luckily, his out of office had his replacements details, including a phone number. My husband rang, and he was really helpful at getting him located.’
Helpful members of staff combed through lost property and eventually located Toby sitting in a pile amongst other lost items.
He has since been moved to an office in Bishop’s Stortford, Herts, and is now waiting to be couriered back to Alice.
A spokesman for EasyJet said: ‘We’re delighted that Toby was found safe and well at Luton Airport and will be reunited with Alice.
‘We wish them many more happy travels together.’
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