Keeping Guns Off Planes: Common Sense Rules to Live By

By Ready to Fire News On Nov 16, 2018

The vast majority of gun owners are law-abiding, smart individuals who simply love the sport of hunting, shooting or are firm believers in protecting their homes and families. Then, you’ve got a few people who truly make the rest of the gun-owning society look bad…

In October 2018 alone, the Transportation Security Association (TSA) confiscated more than 350 loaded guns at airport security checkpoints around the country. Now, c’mon, surely everyone knows by 2018 that it’s against the law to carry loaded weapons onto a plane, right?

Apparently, not — and these individuals making bad decisions are causing a great deal of harm to the rest of the gun-carrying community.

Loaded Firearms on Planes — Just (Don’t) Do It

Based on statistics provided by the TSA, more than 771.5 million passengers traveled through U.S. airports in 2017. Of the 2 million individuals traversing through our airports on a daily basis, around 10 of them were carrying firearms. While this doesn’t sound like much when you look at the total people, adding up the number of guns that were seized on an annual basis — 3,957, with 80% of these being loaded — it can be a more frightening statistic when shared through the liberal media. It would only take one or two of these weapons sneaking through in the wrong hands to cause a real terror situation.

When Guns Are Legal on Planes

According to the TSA.gov website, there are very specific rules and regulations around carrying your firearms and ammunition on a plane. They must be in a locked, hard-sided container and must be a part of your checked luggage — not a carry-on. Both the weapon and the ammunition must be declared to the TSA agents during check-in, and the gun must be completely inaccessible. Guns must also be completely unloaded, with any firearm parts such as clips, bolts and firing pins also stored in checked baggage. These regulations are not limited to “real” firearms, either. Even replica or toys must be placed into checked luggage, as it’s difficult for scanners to easily tell the difference between a toy gun and a real one, which can cause significant delays during the security process. The only gun component that is allowed in your carry-on bag is a rifle scope.

Bringing loaded weapons through the U.S. airport system is on the rise, which is unfortunate. Anytime the liberal media has an opportunity to share a statistic that they think will frighten the public into creating more furor around gun restrictions, they are going to take that opportunity. The only way we can continue to protect our Second Amendment rights is by making the right decisions to appropriately pack and store our firearms before heading into the friendly skies.

~ Ready to Fire News