TSA officers catch 2 guns in 3 days at Pittsburgh International

Security officers at Pittsburgh International Airport on Tuesday stopped the second person in three days from bringing a loaded gun past the Transportation Security Administration checkpoint, according to a spokeswoman.

Both men — one stopped Sunday and the other on Tuesday morning — claimed they’d forgotten they had the loaded firearms with them, said TSA spokeswoman Lisa Farbstein.

The man stopped Tuesday, who is not facing criminal charges, told officers he’d taken the gun with him on camping trip and forgot he had it with him when he later went to the airport.

“I have two pieces of advice to offer,” said Karen Keys-Turning, the TSA’s federal security director at Pittsburgh International. “First is that if you own a firearm, you need to know where it is at all times because that’s part of being a responsible gun owner.”

Keys-Turner suggested, travelers should start with an empty carry-on bag when they’re packing for a flight. Doing so, she said, ensures that the traveler is aware of everything that’s gone into the bag.

The incident came two days after TSA officers stopped a Wheeling, West Virginia, man with a loaded .22-caliber revolver in his backpack. He, too, told officers he forgot the loaded revolver was in his bag, Farbstein said.

Eleven guns have been caught at the airport so far this year, including four in the past 11 days.

Two other men, including one who works on the airport grounds, were stopped with guns over the Memorial Day weekend. Both men were charged with carrying a firearm without a license.

Air travel plummeted in early 2020 as the covid-19 pandemic swept across the world, and two years later it is still has not fully recovered. Despite the decline in passengers, TSA officers have been catching more guns per person in Pittsburgh and across the country.

Prior to the pandemic, the number of guns caught at security checkpoints in Pittsburgh had been creeping slightly upward for years: 32 in 2017, 34 in 2018 and 35 in 2019, according to TSA data. In 2021, officers stopped 22 travelers with guns at the airport despite a pandemic-driven decline in air travel.

When a security officer spots a gun on the checkpoint X-ray machine, the entire security line grinds to halt while Allegheny County Police respond. County police alert the FBI and, while most travelers are permitted to take their flights, they can be fined anywhere from $3,000 to $13,910.