Even as air travel languished below pre-pandemic levels, the number of travelers attempting to pass through airport security checkpoints with firearms in 2021 reached its highest point since the Transportation Security Administration began tracking it 20 years ago, the agency said Wednesday.
The TSA has stopped travelers carrying more than 5,700 firearms at U.S. airports since the beginning of 2021, far surpassing the previous record of 4,432 firearms in 2019, according to TSA spokesperson R. Carter Langston. A final tally will be announced next month.
About 85% of the firearms found in 2021 were loaded, Langston said.
The surge in gun discoveries comes even though travel demand remains about 25% below the pre-pandemic pace of 2019, according to the U.S. Bureau of Transportation Statistics.
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