Flying after a reloading session and carrying a range bag past TSA

[Ryguy]

I am going to Arkansas for a wild boar hunt/shoot on Thursday and I just loaded a bunch of 300 win mag rounds. 2 questions:

1. Has anyone ever been harassed by TSA for having nitrocellulose residue on them?

2. How about problems with a carry-on that they bring to the range with them. My range bag is perfect for a carry on and will contain my clothes for the week.

Any experiences?

 

[dddoo7]

Flying after a reloading session and carrying a range bag past TSA

My dad got pulled aside and checked after the electric sniffer found something on his bag. It was a bag that he normally carried a pistol in (was not in the bag at the airport) but apparently that was enough to trigger their alarms. They just searched the bag and sent him on his way.

Dad does not reload...so I would say that there is a very good chance that you will get checked if your bag has been to the range and around reloading stuff

 

[Jefe~]

Regardless of my personal experiences, which have been good, If you have concerns don't do it. No reason to create a potential issue when there really isn't one.

 

[oldfatguy]

The chance of something being left in the bag that will get you strip searched is just too great. Sure, your range bag might be GTG at the airport, might not. Really bad idea to use the same bag for both.

OFG

 

[ZombieMonkey]

1. Yes, I was putting away a bunch of components before going on my last trip and got pulled aside. They swabbed my hands and I explained everything and was back on my way two minutes later after they went through all of my stuff. Wasn't a big deal.

2. Not an issue, it may get you stopped like I was, but you'll be back on your way rather quickly.

 

[Downzero]

I have heard that smokeless powder doesn't burn fast enough to set off their machines.

 

[BoilerUP]

I would not EVER take a range/reloading bag through a TSA checkpoint.

 

[lancetkenyon]

Last month I went out of town for work. I had been reloading the night before. I got the swab test done and the sniffers never picked anything up. My range bag is also my camera and binocular bag, which both get used frequently and go on planes as a carry-on. Never an issue there either.

 

[trauma1]

I have a friend who did not know a couple of 22 shells had fallen down into the bottom of a pocket in his bag. Cost him $550 per shell and lots if TSA time.

 

[bax]

Between 1980 and 2013, I flew an average of about 25 weeks a year. Between 2001 and 2013, the average was more like 33 week a year - almost always 4 segments a week. During that time, I reloaded and shot a lot. Unless I was traveling with a firearm, I never took a range bag to the airport. I almost never wore clothes to the range then flew with them unless I washed them first. I was always careful to wash my hands after gun cleaning and reloading -- a good idea anyway. I never had an issue, I was never stopped -- not once in all of those trips -- for failing the nitrates test. I don't know if reloading, not washing up, then traveling will get you stopped. But if you did what I did, you should not get stopped.

 

[Tristian19]

Youmay wanna grab the popcorn at this time. I'll try to keep this one straight to point. Not sure if it may or may not be similar and or helpful to you.

Last time I flew with two rigs from NY to FL I first checked my two rigs in. After which i was escorted to security to surrender them. Once done I then proceeded to regular Security Screening where TSA stopped me with many questions. Including a visit from Mr Supervisor.
I was stopped for:
A. 9 volt batteries (chrono) <<< main reason I was stopped
B. Bushnell 20-40x60 spotting scope
C. Chronograph (Security had NO CLUE what this was)
D. L.E. Wilson .338 LM Bullet Seater ( Security had NO CLUE , again)

I arrived at airport more than three hours before flight EXPECTING to be asked 1,000 questions - which I was.

Once I explained to TSA I had checked in two rigs then ONLY did what I was carrying on board make any sense to them BUT did not mean I skated on through security checkpoint. I still had a lot of explaining to do. (If you are not flying with your toys then... ???)

Note: I also took a visit to airport a few weeks prior (without) firearms to speak with Check-in Supervisors to make sure I knew exactly how to come and they knew to expect me in near future. I flew two days BEFORE Connecticut Shooting in 2012

Overall, TSA did their job and I am glad they did. TSA statted off very aggressive. I told two TSA agents i deliberately arrived more than three hours before my flight expecting many questions and told them to ask any questions they wanted I was fine. I understood they where doing their job and I WANTED THEM TOO. I also volunteered a lot of information being I already knew TSA was going to be clueless with what I was carrying. I live in NY - should I say anything more?

Not sure if any above helps in anyway.

sent via Tapatalk

 

[427Cobra]

I fix 737s for Southwest Airlines, and since 2003 I have been a Insulin Dependent Diabetic, my man purse(Meter and Testing Supplies) goes everywhere I go, and I routinely get picked for enhanced TSA searches(TSA meets their quota, and Employees can't BITCH), I fail every time the "Explosive Residue Test", the TSA always double searches my overnight bag, and asks why, I tell them I shoot a lot, and proceed with slight delay, my advice is tell the truth from the beginning and rock on.

 

[Pinecone]

Was going through security once (pre-TSA) and they wanted to swab a guys bag and his clothes. He just started laughing. They asked why and he said, go ahewad and swab me, you WILL find stuff. They started to hasle him about why, so he calmly told them has was an artillery officer and EVERYTHING he owned was contaminated.

If you wash your hands and clothes, there will be no residue. Going shooting and directly to the airport might get you extra attention and searching.

If you carry your range bag, be SURE there is nothing in there that will be frowned upon. Better to buy a new bag for traveling.

 

[bogeybrown]

Because I work with explosives every day overseas, I try to be very vigilant about what touches what and and which items may be contaminated, especially because I travel into the U.S. from the middle east. I even carry a letter explaining why some of my shit may glow in the dark. Amazingly I haven't gotten popped, even transiting Heathrow. I get pulled aside for "random" searches all the time, but have yet to get hammered.

My big "excitement" usually comes when I transit my home airport, where my former Bomb Squad commander is now the TSA explosives guru. Whenever he spies me coming through he comes out and laughs and insists that all my shit get swabbed just to see what happens. As payback, he knows that I have his cell and that he is required to talk to TSA anywhere in America and get me out of shit if I ever get jammed up.

 

[buggsb]

Regardless of my personal experiences, which have been good, If you have concerns don't do it. No reason to create a potential issue when there really isn't one.

Exactly this. Why would one deliberately delay what is already a time consuming process at the airport? Take a shower after reloading, take something else besides the range bag and don't carry anything onboard that would be controversial.

Sure you could explain why a swab test indicated positive, but why would you want to? As trauma1 said, those couple of stray rounds stuck in a corner of the range bag just aren't worth that....his friend could have bought several new carry-on bags for the thousand bucks of fines he had to pay.

 

[rpk762]

I went to FLA. Last month and only with a carry on that almost never does not have a handgun, a ton of bullets and spent castings in it. All I did was take everything out of it and shook it out. I then put my trip stuff in it and was fine. I did not get stopped or questioned. For the record some say my look is probable cause.

 

[shoot4fun]

I would not EVER take a range/reloading bag through a TSA checkpoint.

Very sound advice. See story below. Stuff happens; don't let it happen to you.
Last trip to WY I was swabbed on the way there. I reload and shoot quite a bit and it wasn't the first time they ever checked me. But TSA has never asked me any questions and I have felt NO need to explain why they might have picked up a trace.
Last summer I "cleared" my carry on back pack only to have a speed loader and five rounds of 38 Special hit the floor of the plane when I went to stuff the bag in an overhead bin. Some guy picked it up as fast as it hit and handed it to me with a closed fist. He didn't say a thing, just smiled and sat down. Did he think I was an air marshall or was he just cool? No matter, he surely saved my week.
So TSA doesn't catch everything but I think it is very rare and it taught me one helluva lesson.

 

[Aimsmall55]

I am going to Arkansas for a wild boar hunt/shoot on Thursday and I just loaded a bunch of 300 win mag rounds. 2 questions:

1. Has anyone ever been harassed by TSA for having nitrocellulose residue on them?

2. How about problems with a carry-on that they bring to the range with them. My range bag is perfect for a carry on and will contain my clothes for the week.

Any experiences?

Hell yes !! They got me on a trip to San Francisco. Loaded a bunch of stuff 2 days earlier and didn't even think about it. Well, my wife and I go through the metal detector and all of a sudden a guy asked me to step to the side. I said to my self "OH SHIT". They swabbed my hand and it tested positive for powder residue. He got to questioning me ( along with 4 others who were there by now) and I told them the truth.... I load my own ammunition and shoot a lot of long range stuff and a few competitions now and then. I was lucky enough to have a Sinclair reloading magazine as well as 5 other magazines like midway usa in my backpack I was carrying , WHICH I IMMEDIATELY SHOWED THEM and it kind of made them a little less worried that I was a threat. Well ....
Then came the pat down. Let's just say they were thorough... My wife was laughing her ass off while some 260# hulkster was making me his .... You get the point. After that, they started loosening up and we got to talking. They said they had to do the exact same thing to the Mississippi State Golf Team a few days before. I asked why.... The fertilizer from the grass on the fairway set off the sniffer!!! The WHOLE GOLF TEAM got the pat down. My wife still busts my balls about it.
After it was all said and done I told them all " Thank you guys". They were like " uhhhh ok". I had to explain that I feel a HELL OF ALOT BETTER knowing they were being vigilant and making everybody safer. They seemed to appreciate that. I'm sure they weren't used to getting a thank you after a thorough pat down.

 

[Pinecone]

I always are nice and smile at the TSA folks. They have a job that puts them through 8 hours of people who are PO'd and the starting pay for a TSA person is SMALL (like under $25K per year).

Most of the time, they are OK people, just doing their job the best they can.

 

[samnev]

Regardless of my personal experiences, which have been good, If you have concerns don't do it. No reason to create a potential issue when there really isn't one.

+1 I reload and shoot a lot. I always go thru the TSA check and even though i have showered haven't shot or reloaded for many days before traveling. Have on new freshly washed clothes that have never seen any shooting or used for reloading I almost always get pulled aside for the sniffer test and pat down, go figure.

 

[spamassassin]

I got a hassle by Denver security. The man with the rubber glove was surprisingly gentle but very unprofessional. An extra scan of my bags, signing a paper promising I didn't do anything naughty and 5 minutes extra listening to confused sounding grunts coming from what appeared to be nicely uniformed cavemen. It wasn't that big a deal and my bag was thoroughly laden with nitrate residue.

 

[alpine44]

Reloading, shooting, and "smelling" like powder is still legal AFAIK. Don't get paranoid about your hobbies just because someone else gets paranoid about aviation safety.

If I cannot avoid using the airlines, I plan on being hassled and deal with it. Whether it is because of nitrate residue, the origin of my flight, my destination, a random profiling program, the phase of the moon or whatever does not really matter. I look at it like going to the motor vehicle department. If things go smoothly, I consider myself lucky.

But I am certainly not going to change the rest of my life for these charades.

 

[hermosabeach]

I got swabbed with a backpack I had taken to the range...

the machine squaked

The TSA agent pulled out a book, read the chart, and said I was free to catch my flight....


A local instructor gets to the airport 2 hours early as he teaches explosive breaching to LEO & Mil. If he gets swabbed, he knows that it will be at least an extra hour

 

[rcamuglia]

I've traveled to shooting competitions on planes since 1992. Checking guns and gear every time. I've seen some amazing shit and most of it was mistakes by the TSA or stupidity by the TSA.

A buddy brought his shooting bag as a carry-on. He had everything in there like shotgun chokes, glasses, plugs, etc... They X-rayed the bag and went through it. They pulled out the chokes that were in Briley cases and asked what they were. He told them they were choke tubes. They didn't know what a choke was. He explained that they were to be screwed into the end of a shotgun barrel to vary the pattern size. The TSA freaked. "It's a part of a gun?!!!!" They made him run them down and check them in his luggage. They let us go through and let him carry on his shooting bag with everything else in it.

When we arrived at the hotel, he went through his shooting bag to organize it. The bag also had 10 live 12 gauge shells that the TSA failed to find.


Had a friend visit for some shooting lessons. Same story. When she arrived after getting off of the plane and checked out what was in her shooting bag she carried on, it had a full box of loose 12 gauge shells in her shell pouch....



You shouldn't have any problem if you simply go through your carry on, whatever it is, and make sure there's nothing in it that is prohibited.

 

[CthulhuAwakens]

The TSA agents are morons and the explosive detectors they use will hit on nonexplosive chemicals (found in hand lotion, etc.) as well as explosives . They don't always do the swab test, so you might be fine if you just let your bag go through the metal detector and subject yourself to being bombarded with radiation in the cancer tube. An obvious flaw in their system and illustrates that they're strictly reactive in nature. If they do pick up anything you'll be subjected to a secondary pat down in a private room where the "supervisor" will conduct the procedure. They'll search and swab your bag again and see if they pick up anything or find any contraband. These highly trained, intelligent individuals, will be looking for a round thingy with a fuse sticking out of it or an alarm clock strapped to a bundle of red cylindrical objects. Thank god they aren't the same high school dropouts that worked for Pinkerton pre 911...you know just federalized and given a false sense of authority.

Now...If they find a shell casing or something like that I'm sure they'll make it more of a pain in the ass (maybe literally) for you. Leave the bag at home and save yourself the hassle of arguing with idiots. They'll only drag you down to their level and beat you with experience.

 

[JoshcBoucher]

I just came back from a trip to Wyoming. I used my "range pack" as my carry on. No problems, and they even "swiped it", and my hands, with the patches, and no problems. No record of how many empties came home in that bag, but it wasn't enough to be a problem.

 

[bax]

Silly story time.

I few years ago, I was working in San Francisco. I was walking down Embarcadero with some friends and saw an odd-looking ship. We walked out the pier. There was a gate with a guard in military uniform. We chatted up the guard. A couple minutes later an E8 come down from the ship and starts to chat up the girl who was with us - she WAS attractive. He offered a tour and we took him up on it. She (the ship, not the girl) was one of those early design littoral combat ships and ran at a top speed of about 45 knots. As we toured, we passed a box full of 50 BMG cases. He tells this story. They were running up the coast from Los Angeles and the supercargo decided on some practice with the 50 BMG. Some boxes were tossed overboard and a good time was had by all. The cases were policed up and tossed in the box. Do we want one as a souvenir ? Sure I say. So I take it back to the hotel. A couple days later, I fly home. From San Francisco. Not the friendliest place for guns. I never check bags, I always carry on. So my bag with that 50 BMG case went through the xray and the sniffer stuff - yeah, whatever. Nobody said a thing. That is the only 50 case I happen to have right now and until I read this thread, I hadn't noticed that I SHOULD have had a problem getting it home.

 

[Pinecone]

Your carry on bags are X-rayed. Only if they swab them do they check for nitrates. There is no test for "explosives" only tests for certain chemicals that are common in explosives, like nitrates.

And I said before, TSA folks get to spend 8 hours every day dealing with PITA people for a VERY low amount of money.