In a surprising finding that has a number of possible causes, the Transportation Safety Administration reports that it has seen a 270% jump in gun seizures at airports relative to the number of passengers, which has dropped 95%.
The report, which covers the period from March 22 through April 22, showed that TSA seized 58 guns, for a rate of one for every 80,000 screenings, compared to one for every 216,200 screenings in the same period last year.
TSA isn’t telling anyone its theory of why the rate has risen sharply, but an aviation security professor at Metropolitan State University in Denver thinks the reasons include rising gun sales and an ‘apocalypse mindset’ that makes people more likely to carry. Prof. Jeffrey Price also pointed out that with fewer passengers to screen, they can take more time without causing big backups.
Given years of reports of how much contraband government testers have gotten through TSA screening, it seems likely that the last answer accounts for the biggest portion.
