A record breaking number of firearms were found in passengers' bags at US airports last year.
Guards working for the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) uncovered 6,542 firearms at 262 airports across 2022
The total is higher than 2021's significant haul of 5,972, and nearly double that of the 3,257 found in 2020.
Each day in 2022 18 guns were found in passenger's bags, with weapons ranging from small pistols to much larger, semi-automatic weapons.
It represents a six-fold increase since 2010, while nearly nine in 10 of the weapons were loaded.
Most of the guns' owners claimed to have forgotten the weapon was there.
Others were actively trying to smuggle the firearms through security, concealing them in items varying from a raw chicken and jars of peanut butter, to a PlayStation and an arm sling.
Jeffrey Price, former assistant director of security at Denver international airport and co-author of a book on aviation security, told the Guardian: “One of our unique American traits is the number of people who purchase a weapon and forget they even have the thing with them.
“A lot of those people who buy a gun in the heat of the moment, they toss it in their laptop bag or in their purse, and then they forget they have it.
"Next thing you know, they’re at the airport and oh, my gosh, I forgot I put that in there."
The finds come as more and more guns are sold in the US, with the roughly one million sold each month across the US figure shooting up to 1.9million during one particular early month of the coronavirus pandemic.
The five U.S. airports where the most firearms were unearthed is Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, which topped the list with 448 firearm finds.
Dallas Fort Worth International Airport came in second with 385 followed by Houston’s George Bush Intercontinental Airport with 298; Nashville International Airport with 213 and Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport with 196.
Orlando International Airport; Denver International Airport; Austin-Bergstrom International Airport; Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport and Tampa International Airport round out the Top 10.
For every million passengers screened by the TSA, 8.6 guns were found in 2022 - or one firearm for every 116,394 traveller checked.
Even though guns are legal to own in all US states, with laws about the specifics of ownership different in each, Americans are not allowed to take firearms onto planes in their handluggage.
Over 18s are allowed to carry unloaded firearms in a locked hard-sided container as checked baggage.
When a TSA officers sees the image of a firearm on the X-ray screen, they immediately notify the local airport law enforcement agency who remove it and speak to the gun's owner.
What happens to the firearm and the traveller is up to the discretion of the airport law enforcement agency.
The potential legal repercussion, which may be a simple fine, is determined by factors including whether the firearm was loaded and whether there was accessible ammunition.
On many occasions the gun owner is simply allowed to return to their car to stash the weapon, before getting on the flight.
In the UK - where gun ownership is much more tightly regulated than in the US - firearms are similarly banned from carry-on bags.
The following items are also not allowed in checked luggage.
- Blasting caps
- Detonators and fuses
- Imitation explosive devices (including replica or model guns)
- Mines, grenades, and other explosive military stores
- Fireworks and pyrotechnics
- Smoke canisters
- Smoke cartridges
- Dynamite
- Gunpowder
- Flares
- Hand grenades
- Gun cigarette lighters
- Plastic explosives (including black powder and percussion caps)
