Narrative:

Ground crew had done a FOD sweep and got into position to guide us in and we had cleared the wingtip areas. We had already crossed the zipper line and we were being marshaled in when 5 to 10 feet from the normal stopping point there was a shudder from the aircraft. I immediately stopped and tried to assess what had happened. I asked the first officer if everything was okay on his side. The first officer looked out his side. At the same time; the lead marshaller had realized that we had our right wingtip come into contact with a tail baggage cart that was placed between a blue baggage cart and a concrete barrier. We contacted maintenance and operations and shut down the engines and performed the shut down checklist. We coordinated with operations to deplane the aircraft. Maintenance then moved the aircraft. We secured the aircraft and then we're met by operations management to be escorted to screening. Maintenance did an initial inspection and found no damage. No further incident. Three wing walkers may have prevented this. Glare from the sun was quite considerable and most likely contributed to the marshaller not seeing the hazard. Also; the tail baggage cart was parked in an area that made it difficult; if not impossible; to see. Management did say that the caution lines have been repainted recently as well as a high turnover rate in ground staffing. All of these factors could have contributed to this.

Related reports:

Google
 

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: CRJ-200 flight crew reports the right wing tip contacting a baggage cart while being marshalled into the gate.

Narrative: Ground crew had done a FOD sweep and got into position to guide us in and we had cleared the wingtip areas. We had already crossed the zipper line and we were being marshaled in when 5 to 10 feet from the normal stopping point there was a shudder from the aircraft. I immediately stopped and tried to assess what had happened. I asked the First Officer if everything was okay on his side. The First Officer looked out his side. At the same time; the lead marshaller had realized that we had our right wingtip come into contact with a tail baggage cart that was placed between a blue baggage cart and a concrete barrier. We contacted Maintenance and Operations and shut down the engines and performed the shut down checklist. We coordinated with OPS to deplane the aircraft. Maintenance then moved the aircraft. We secured the aircraft and then we're met by OPS Management to be escorted to screening. Maintenance did an initial inspection and found no damage. No further incident. Three wing walkers may have prevented this. Glare from the sun was quite considerable and most likely contributed to the Marshaller not seeing the hazard. Also; the tail baggage cart was parked in an area that made it difficult; if not impossible; to see. Management did say that the caution lines have been repainted recently as well as a high turnover rate in ground staffing. All of these factors could have contributed to this.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of July 2013 and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.