City rock band's instruments damaged while in flight

Careless baggage-handling  on a Mumbai-Bengaluru Jet Airways flight has left the city-based rock band, Oxygen On The Rocks, in trouble. Despite packing their instruments with the 'Fragile' marking, the band is now left with a damaged drummer's Cymbal and a keyboard with a broken cabinet.

The band had completed a show in Mumbai on December 16 and boarded Jet Flight 9W1415 the next day. "We got the instruments marked 'Fragile. On collecting the instrument at the Bengaluru airport, we found the Cymbal of our drummer damaged," Souvik Chakraborty, OOTR's vocalist, told DH. But the keyboard was missing.

They filed a complaint. "But the person at the spot only captured a few pictures of the damaged Cymbal and told us he would intimate the higher-ups. There has been no response since," said Souvik.

The artistes were told the keyboard would arrive by the next flight, and it would be delivered to their residence.

The keyboard did arrive by courier on Sunday around 6 pm. But to their shock, the OOTR team found its back cabinet was broken. "It was heartbreaking to find our invaluable instruments damaged," lamented the band's drummer, G Bo.

The metallic Cymbal had a dent and was rendered vulnerable to cracks. "The damage makes it unplayable. We never expected this. These instruments are our bread and butter," he said.

For Souvik, it was fortunate that the band had decided against including their costly guitar in the check-in baggage.

"Thankfully, we took it as a hand baggage. But we had taken great care in packing the keyboard inside a case. Still, it had body damage."

Jet Airways officials were not reachable for a response.