Pittsburgh airport checkpoint detects 2nd gun in 3 days

A Westmoreland County man was caught with a loaded 9mm handgun in his carry-on bag at Pittsburgh International Airport on Friday, officials said.

It was the second gun detected by Transportation Security Administration officers in Pittsburgh in a three-day period.

On Aug. 4, they stopped a Fayette County man from bringing a loaded handgun onto an airplane.

TSA officers said they found firearms in carry-on bags at a rate three times higher in July than in the same month in 2019, even though passenger volume is significantly lower.

“It’s just really disconcerting that even during a pandemic, we’re seeing people bringing guns to checkpoints,” said TSA spokeswoman Lisa Farbstein.

TSA officers detected 15.3 guns per million passengers last month, compared with 5.1 guns per million people screened during July 2019. TSA administrator David Pekoske said the rate is especially alarming, given that the TSA screened about 75% fewer passengers in July compared with the previous year’s volume.

“TSA is diligently working to ensure our employees and passengers are safe and secure while traveling during a pandemic, and yet we are noticing a significant increase in loaded firearms coming into checkpoints,” Pekoske said. “Travelers must understand that firearms are prohibited items at airports and in the passenger cabins of aircraft. As hard as we are working to mitigate other risks at this time, no one should be introducing new ones.”

In the Friday incident in Pittsburgh, a TSA officer spotted the handgun on the checkpoint X-ray machine’s monitor. TSA alerted Allegheny County police. Officers responded to the checkpoint and questioned the West Newton man. Police allowed the man to return the handgun to his vehicle. However, he is facing federal civil penalties.

A typical first offense for carrying a loaded handgun into a checkpoint is $4,100. It applies to travelers with or without concealed gun carry permits, because those permits do not allow firearms to be carried onto an airplane.

“People really have to pay attention to what they’re doing and to what they are bringing with them to the checkpoint, or they are going to face one really high federal civil penalty,” Farbstein said.

Passengers are allowed to travel with firearms in checked baggage if they are unloaded and packed properly in a hard-sided case and locked and packed separately from ammunition.