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Mystery "fire" in order sent??

GrahamGraham
edited July 2014 in General Vote Up0Vote Down

This is as strange as strange can be!

This is how an order sent to a customer looked on arrival, consisting of 3 x Black Mini-Heads and 3 DSG Clips in a poly bag, then in a padded envelope.

Any ideas?

Thanks G

image

Comments

  • 11 Comments sorted by Votes Date Added
  • Markyd7Markyd7
    Vote Up0Vote Down
    Wow! Does the firs look like it started inside? Or out?
  • GrahamGraham
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    To me it looks from the inside!

    First thought was chemical reaction, now looking at the location of where the parts were - it would seem they were under the bar code that gets scanned with a laser, maybe it got stuck under a scanner somewhere? But then surely USPS (someone) would notice? I find it incomprehensible that they would actually deliver something in this state!!!

    Other than that a mystery..
  • Markyd7Markyd7
    Vote Up0Vote Down
    It is strange! The rest of the packet looks fine. If the whole packet was subject to extreme heat you'd expect the tape to have melted on the outside!
    I would think the poly bag or bubble wrap would be the first to react from any heat.

    What do USPS have to say?
  • pumbaughpumbaugh
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    It looks like something from the outside to me for sure. If it was from the inside, almost guaranteed to have damage on the other side of the envelope, and the inside opposite the damage holes looks pretty clean/undamaged to me. If something combusted on the inside it would burn both sides. Honestly, looks like something went through a roller/sorter machine that should not have. It gets jammed up and the rollers keep spinning creating an awful amount of friction on/jamming up the envelope until someone yanks it out....

    One place I worked at had a bin of mail delivered in a sack all wet and burned after the delivery truck was in an accident. All we got was an Oops there was a problem note with it :)
  • DadsAfolDadsAfol
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    The USPS sorting and processing centers use large conveyor belt systems. Every once in a while a package gets stuck, and the friction of the belts moving against the package causes the burn effect.
  • GrahamGraham
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    Well I hope I can get "the evidence" back - funny enough I have been recently thinking about going (back) to college to study forensics!

    Nothing like a good mystery to solve… "jammed in the machine" sounds pretty good for now :)
  • Markyd7Markyd7
    Vote Up0Vote Down
    Yes that sounds good. You can see some direction to the black marks.
  • DagsBricksDagsBricks
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    Good evidence for why minifig heads should not go letter rate or whatever your equivalent roller-sorted mail class is.

    Brian
  • GrahamGraham
    Vote Up0Vote Down

    I paid package rate - generated on line - with bar code etc - it would seem that it "got in the wrong line" (ie machinable letter) - what gets me is that they had the cheek to deliver it like that.

    Not worth causing a fuss over $2 in parts and $2 in postage… I shall present local PO with a photograph tho

    G
  • ThorThor
    Vote Up0Vote Down
    This reminds me of my own case of mysterious damage during shipping. Graham, since you are into forensics, let's see how you explain this...

    I ship an order to a customer in a poly bubble mailer. The customer receives the order and fires an angry email off to me claiming I soaked his order in foul-smelling stale beer. The picture he sends me shows the poly mailer inside one of those clear post office bags they put damaged parcels with their standard "oops" sign. The inside of the clear bag is dripping wet. Liquid is dripping out of my poly mailer into the inside of the clear PO bag.

    The poly bubble mailers I use are waterproof. The only way liquid can get inside is where the self sealing flap folds over and has small holes where the flap loops over and meets the top and bottom edges of the mailer. A mere spill won't get inside the mailer. The only way beer could get inside this mailer is (a) if I shipped my customer free beer by pouring it inside the mailer before sealing it, or (b) if someone held down the mailer submerged in a bowl or bucket of beer.

    The former is impossible because I would never waste good beer in such a manner. Plus the shipping weight shown on my postal receipt was only 0.4 ounces heavier than the weight of the parts in the order. The 0.4 ounces is the weight of my poly mailer and baggies for the parts. If there was that much beer inside the mailer when I shipped it, the weight would have been much more. Assuming, of course, the postal clerk would even accept a parcel dripping with beer.

    That leaves (b). Somebody deliberately tampered with the mailer by holding it submerged in beer.

    Or is there another explanation? I reported this to the PO. They claim they investigated the matter, but they never told me what they found. This one still has me scratching my head.

    Thor
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