When he flies United Airlines, Dave Carroll can't catch a break.

The Halifax-based singer-songwriter became an Internet sensation for his music video "United Breaks Guitars," a folk ballad chronicling his yearlong battle for compensation after a United Airlines baggage handler broke his guitar.

The video nabbed nearly 6 million views on YouTube and prompted the airline to promise it would do better.

But when Carroll flew into Denver International Airport on Sunday, he learned that United had lost his bag.

What's worse, Carroll was in Colorado to do a keynote speech for a group of hundreds of customer-service executives.

"The irony is palpable," Carroll said Thursday in a phone interview.

At the airport, an employee told Carroll that he had to stay by the conveyer belt because his bag was delayed, not lost. As he paced around the room, a federal customs officer told him he had to leave.

Finally, an airport employee confirmed that his bag – filled with guitar cables, a tuner, some CDs and his shoes – was lost.

He was reunited with his luggage on Wednesday morning, a day after his speech.

Carroll doesn't intend to mention the gaffe in his third instalment of the "United Breaks Guitars" trilogy, which is expected to hit the Web before the end of the year.

"The song is about closure," he said. "(United) is trying to make some changes."

When the first United video went viral, the Timmins-born performer was rocketed into the spotlight. He was featured on newscasts around the world, from CNN to the BBC, and the song became the number one download on iTunes the week after it went viral.

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Carroll is now doing speaking tours on customer service, and each day, he receives emails from fans that have had bad experiences with airlines.

"The reach the `United Breaks Guitars' tragedy has had on my career is pretty incredible," he said.