Firearms trainer Jeff Gonzalez from Trident Concepts recently shared some great advice on traveling with firearms.
So after a decade of traveling commercial air, you pick up on a few things. Add the dramatic changes in airline security and it can be a bit confusing. Here are a few tips for traveling with a firearm.
First, know the law where you are going and when in doubt call ahead and if that comes up with some shady information then leave it behind. There are way too many horror stories so forewarned is forearmed. Yes it does suck, but it is a reality we will have to live with for some time to come.
To read the rest of his article visit Trident Concepts.
Tags: Trident Concepts
I live in a metropolitan are that is served by 3 airports. One is huge and known for a TSA staff that’s hostile to passengers. I don’t fly out of that one even when I’m on official business with weapons.
The other two are smaller, but the airport that is furthest from my home has a key feature for travelling with firearms, and that is that passengers check in with their airline, get their bags tagged, THEN deliver their OWN BAGS to an “in view” TSA screening point right there at luggage check in.
In every other respect–two lines, two luggage schleps, this bloows. However, at EVERY in-view screening point I’ve EVER been to (a dozen or more–at airports as large as LAX and as small as Orlando) TSA shunts you off to the side, does the final screening (or summons a cop) to ensure everything is unloaded and ammo is properly packaged, AND YOU LOCK YOUR CASE THEN AND THERE. Exclusive of the piece of mind, you can also put a FAA/TSA compliant case in another piece of luggage that doesn’t scream “expensive or sensitive items inside.”
I’ve had more than one trip (and one class) ruined by the gap between the airline inspection and the TSA final screening that resulted in a case full of guns out in the ether–in one case my guns were unaccounted for for 36 hours. The common thread in the “lost guns capers” was that I handed my case off–UNLOCKED–to an airline employee who then took it someplace out of view (“as per policy”) for final screening (“which, by policy, will be conducted out of passenger’s view”), which might have taken 10 minutes, might have taken 2 hours. Never had anything stolen, ever. But that day (or more) of anxiety (of insurer bureaucracy, of putting crime guns on the street, of replacing equipment no longer in production or restricted by new laws, of the professional implications of losing an agency gun) has taken years off my life expectancy.
These guys are approaching it from a different angle but interesting reading nonetheless.
http://deviating.net/firearms/packing/
I still find it funny (sadly) that people are still having issues flying with firearms stowed under the aircraft. I travel about 4-6 times per year with declared firearms in checked baggage inside hard cases using discreet bags.
From what I was told by a TSA Manager in DFW, TSA policy doesn’t allow firearm cases to be opened for screening, unless it alarms for explosives through external “sampling” of the bag. I assume this to be true considering the airports I’ve traveled through never asked me to open/unlock the case. They usually run my bag through the machine and if the machine “hits”, they swab the outside and send it on it’s way.