This is the stuff that nightmares are made of.

A member of the East Tennessee State University Men’s Golf caught Delta’s baggage handlers treating the team’s clubs like they were, for lack of a better word, trash. As the video shows, one individual elected to repeatedly toss six golf bags (and I imagine several more before the video starts) from the conveyor belt onto the tarmac—including multiple instances where bags were thrown on top of each other.

Nice of @Delta to handle our clubs with such care… pic.twitter.com/5tcIivt9dy

— ETSU Men’s Golf (@ETSU_MGolf) May 22, 2024

It’s unclear whether the ETSU team is traveling from the NCAA Chapel Hill Regional or arriving in California for the NCAA Championships. What is clear is that this is entirely unacceptable.

Traveling is neither inexpensive nor relaxing. Indeed, Delta recently made it even more expensive when they decided to hike their baggage fees, and—as every golfer is aware—flying with your clubs is one of the most nerve-wracking parts of any trip that leave you pondering whether your clubs will even arrive and, if they do, will they get there in one piece?

This is, of course, aggravated by the fact that many airlines, Delta included, require you to release them from any damage to your golf clubs when they’re packaged in a soft case (you can, of course, travel with a hard case, but expect to pay an additional, overweight fee).

And in light of all of these, you would hope that the airlines would treat your belongings with some degree of care. But golf clubs (as well as other personal belongings) being lost or damaged by airlines is a tale as old as time. Indeed, less than a year ago, United Airlines completely destroyed professional golfer Wesley Hunter’s clubs after, among other things, putting a custom grind on his wedges.

Ridiculous @united my bag and clubs ruined to a point I didn’t think was possible. pic.twitter.com/jbxkqbKixb

— Wesley Hunter (@kwhunter22) July 24, 2023

And while everyone reading this is well aware, golf clubs are expensive. Indeed, a damaged driver could mean over $1,000 worth of broken equipment between a driver head and shaft (this is one of the many reasons I remove valuables, like rangefinders and driver, fairway wood, and hybrid heads, and pack them in my carry-on).

As of this moment, it is unclear whether any of ETSU’s equipment was damaged (and if so, hopefully, it can be fixed before the start of the NCAA Championships this Friday, May 24). But what is certain is that all airlines need to put a stop to this; it’s 2024, there has to be a way that oversized and/or overweight objects can be safely removed from the planes and without tossing them around like sandbags.