TSA Monthly Report Shows Guns, Grenades Confiscated
Washington DC April 28 2020
By now you have surely seen the news that fewer people are traveling. Since March, we have been posting the daily figures online with a side-by-side comparison to last year’s statistics. Even still, every day, TSA officers continue to demonstrate an unwavering commitment to serve those who need to travel.
With fewer travelers, you are probably thinking that means fewer firearms caught at our security checkpoints. Well, yes and no. Let’s pull out the abacus and dive into the numbers.
From March 22 to April 22, TSA officers caught 58 guns at checkpoints nationwide. And from March 22 to April 22 of last year, TSA officers caught 346 guns. Okay, so yes, there have been fewer guns caught at our security checkpoints this year during the pandemic than last year when we were all out and about doing our thing. Makes perfect sense. Or does it?
Since our last blog post there have been four days (March 30, April 4, 14 and 16) where not a single firearm was brought to a security checkpoint. Hard to believe, ya know?! For some perspective, last year TSA officers discovered an average of 11 firearms per day in travelers’ carry-on bags. The last time that there were no firearms at checkpoints: Thursday, November 13, 2014. So when we saw four days with no guns, well, we were gobsmacked!
From March 22 to April 22, this year, TSA screened 4,675,650 individuals at checkpoints. And from March 22 to April 22 of last year, TSA officers screened 74,805,525 individuals. That’s a 93.8 percent drop in the number of people screened at checkpoints. Whoa!
Then we rolled up our sleeves, upgraded to our high school calculators and started crunching the numbers. And when we were all done, we discovered that TSA officers actually caught more guns this past month than the same month last year! New math? No, just some good old fashioned division!
Our high school calculators told us that during the same March 22 to April 22 period year-over-year that the rate of gun discoveries for the time period in 2019 was one per 216,200 people screened or .46 guns per 100,000 people screened. But in 2020, the rate of gun discoveries was one per 80,614 people screened or 1.24 guns per 100,000 people screened. Bottom line is that the discovery rate for this current period is 2.68 times greater than for the same period in 2019. And that was with four days of no guns showing up at checkpoints.
To catch everyone up from the last blog, between February 24 to April 22, TSA has found 317 firearms. Of the 317 firearms, 263 were loaded and 94 had a round chambered. You can see all the firearm discoveries from February 24 to April 22 here.
Read our blog on what TSA is doing in response to COVID-19. And visit TSA’s COVID-19 web page for even more up-to-date information on what TSA is doing during this critical time.
