Peruvian Woman Awarded Cash She Found Onboard Iberia Airliner

You might think cleaning airliners is a dead-end job... but it can have its perks, especially in Spain.

Marisol Aguirre is a 47-year-old Peruvian immigrant who once worked for a contractor cleaning planes for Iberia Airlines. The Associated Press reports that back in 2005, she found a bag containing $20,000 in cash in the first-class section of a plane she was cleaning, did the honest thing, and turned the cash in to the airline's lost-&-found.

She tells the AP she had almost forgotten about the find, but was recently contacted by the airline and told to come pick up the cash. Under Spanish law, items of value are held for two years and one day, then become the property of the finder if unclaimed.

Marisol says Iberia, "...has been very honest and treated me very well. It is like a miracle."

She's been carrying debt she incurred to attend her father's funeral about the time the cash was found, and says she can now pay that off, and send some of what's left over to her widowed mother. She comments, "The soul of my father and God have illuminated me."

In the meantime, we're left to wonder who carries $20K in cash around in a bag, and then doesn't come back to look for it. Perhaps Marisol should hurry and deposit those bills in a bank account somewhere... before she accidentally walks by a police canine unit...

FMI: www.iberia.com/us/