Fredericksburg Man Prevented From Bringing Loaded Gun On Flight At Reagan National

ARLINGTON, VA — A Fredericksburg man was stopped by officers from bringing a loaded handgun onto a flight Friday morning at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.

The firearm was a .25 caliber gun was loaded with seven bullets. The man told officers that he had forgotten his gun was with him, according to the Transportation Security Administration.

So far in 2023, TSA officers have prevented eight guns from getting carried onto flights at Reagan National Airport. A total of 29 guns were confiscated at Reagan National Airport security checkpoints in 2022 and a record 30 guns were confiscated in 2021.

The Fredericksburg man’s weapon was caught as he entered a security checkpoint. The X-ray unit issued an alert about the man’s carry-on bag, which was searched, and the gun was removed by Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority police, who confiscated the gun and cited the man on a weapons charge.

“Traveling with a loaded gun that you don’t even know you are carrying is a public safety concern, considering that the bag could be misplaced, or the firearm could accidentally be discharged during a bag search,” John Busch, TSA’s federal security director for the airport, said in a statement Friday.

When traveling with a firearm, it should be unloaded. Then it should be packed in a hard-sided locked case, and taken to the airline check-in counter to be declared and checked, according to TSA.

In addition to the citation by airport police, the man now faces a financial civil penalty. Penalties for carrying a weapon were recently increased to a maximum of $15,000, TSA said.

In 2022, 6,542 firearms were caught at 262 out of 430 airport security checkpoints across the U.S., TSA said. Eighty-eight percent of those guns were loaded.

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