Ocean County Man Packed Loaded 9mm Hand Gun in Carry-on at ACY

An Ocean County man is facing a federal financial penalty for bringing a loaded gun to a security checkpoint at Atlantic City International Airport on Sunday.

According to a statement from the TSA, the man was stopped by the security team at the checkpoint at the ACY on Sunday, March 28, when they detected a 9mm handgun loaded with nine bullets in his carry-on bag.

The man, whose identity was not released, was escorted from the airport by the New Jersey State Police, who had responded to a call by security agents.

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The TSA says this the second gun that was caught at Atlantic City International Airport checkpoint this month. That compares to the two guns were caught at the airport checkpoint during all 12 months in both 2020 and 2019.

Nationwide, TSA officers detected 3,257 firearms on passengers or their carry-on bags at checkpoints last year, although the total number of passengers screened at airport checkpoints across the country fell by 500 million compared to 2019 due to the pandemic.

The result was that twice as many firearms per million passengers screened were detected at checkpoints in 2020 compared to 2019.

In 2020, TSA caught approximately 10 firearms per million passengers as compared to about five firearms per million passengers in 2019.  Of the guns caught by TSA in 2020, about 83 percent were loaded.

Passengers are permitted to travel with firearms in their checked baggage if they are properly packaged and declared at their airline ticket counter to be transported in the belly of the plane.

Guns are absolutely not permitted to be carried onto planes, especially loaded guns. Checked firearms must be unloaded, packed in a hard-sided case, locked, and packed separately from ammunition.

Source: TSA