Mail delivered from 26 years ago
Just last week a friend of ours received 2 Sports Illustrated magazines that evidently were lost in the mail for 26 years. They were delivered wrapped in plastic with a message printed on the outside of the plastic that says "WE CARE" and a letter from the postmaster about the damage to the mail during handling and because of the great volume and rapid processing this sometimes happens.
There's so much to this story that I'm curious about. How did this piece of mail surface after being mailed out originally in 1992? Did it fall behind some wall and just resurface after some remodeling at the post office? Is there some sort of code that makes the postal workers responsible for any mail no matter how old that hasn't been delivered if found that must be delivered? How often does this kind of thing happen?
According to an article back in 2012 the U.S. Postal Service handles over 160 billion pieces of mail a year, which is over 6,400 items a second. It's amazing that majority of this physical mail gets to where it's supposed to go. Typically after one year if mail is missing an address in which to send to and it can't be determined where it should go after scanning it and it's determined that the value is more than $25 it goes up for auction online and anyone can bid on the item. There are two different locations where all lost mail ends up either in Atlanta, GA or St. Paul, MN.
So if you're missing mail and never comes there's a good chance it's in Atlanta or St. Paul and if it can be determined that it's worth less than $25 and it's been over a year since it was sent you most likely will never see it. They shred it.
So in light of all this I'm even more surprised that my friend received these 26 year old magazines.
There's so much to this story that I'm curious about. How did this piece of mail surface after being mailed out originally in 1992? Did it fall behind some wall and just resurface after some remodeling at the post office? Is there some sort of code that makes the postal workers responsible for any mail no matter how old that hasn't been delivered if found that must be delivered? How often does this kind of thing happen?
According to an article back in 2012 the U.S. Postal Service handles over 160 billion pieces of mail a year, which is over 6,400 items a second. It's amazing that majority of this physical mail gets to where it's supposed to go. Typically after one year if mail is missing an address in which to send to and it can't be determined where it should go after scanning it and it's determined that the value is more than $25 it goes up for auction online and anyone can bid on the item. There are two different locations where all lost mail ends up either in Atlanta, GA or St. Paul, MN.
So if you're missing mail and never comes there's a good chance it's in Atlanta or St. Paul and if it can be determined that it's worth less than $25 and it's been over a year since it was sent you most likely will never see it. They shred it.
So in light of all this I'm even more surprised that my friend received these 26 year old magazines.