Claim-check that forbidden object

THANK YOU for a good summary about ways of dealing with forbidden objects accidentally taken into airports [“Oops, You Have a Pocketknife at the Airport. What to Do?” Travel Insider, Feb. 27]. There is another possible option.

In 2003 I triggered the security X-ray at Male International Airport in the Maldives after I forgot to take a small pocketknife out of my purse. With my baggage long since checked, I feared my little knife was a goner. But the guard showed me to a desk where I filled out a form and the knife was sealed into a bag with a label. It would travel in the baggage compartment of my same plane, I was told.

Upon arrival, I took my receipt to the claim window and was reunited with my knife on the spot.

Jane Rumph

Pasadena