Security officials at an airport in Baltimore stopped a woman from getting through after discovering that she was carrying a pair of stiletto high heels in the shape of a gun in her bag.
Lisa Farbstein, spokeswoman for the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), said that the woman was prevented from passing through a checkpoint at the Baltimore-Washington International (BWI) Thurgood Marshall Airport after security personnel saw the oddly-shaped metallic heels in her carry-on luggage. It also had fake bullet accents placed around the soles.
Aside from the handgun-shaped footwear, the woman's bag contained bracelets lined with faux bullets as well.
The TSA strictly prohibits travelers from carrying "replica guns or ammunition" when passing through security checkpoints at airports.
Farbstein said that the security officials at BWI informed the woman that she could place her items in her checked luggage. She tried to have them checked but she ended up having to leave her handgun-shaped heels and bracelets with the TSA so that she could still catch her flight.
Intercepting Firearms At Airports
The TSA has beefed up its effort in preventing firearms from being transported through airport security checkpoints across the United States.
The agency was able to intercept 2,653 firearms placed by passengers in their carry-on bags for the entirety of 2015. This figure is 20 percent higher compared to the number of firearms TSA officials confiscated the previous year. Of the total number of intercepted firearms, about 2,198 (82.8 percent) were loaded.
The TSA said it has also established state-of-the-art technologies and new techniques for better passenger identification, which contributed to improved transportation security across different transportation modes around the country,
The five airports that had the most discoveries of firearms last year were Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport (153), Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport (144), Houston George Bush Intercontinental Airport (100), Denver International Airport (90) and Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport (73).
The agency warns that passengers who will bring firearms to airport security checkpoints may face criminal charges from law enforcement and civil penalties from the TSA.
The woman's handgun-shaped stiletto high heels in the report falls under firearm replicas, which the TSA said should be placed only in checked baggage.
