TSA confirmed to CBS News its officers missed the four rounds of hunting ammo in Watson’s carry-on when he and his wife departed from Oklahoma City in April. A spokesperson for the agency told CBS News the TSA is addressing the oversight internally.
America’s finest.
It’s okay - just as long as it’s not a slightly larger pack of toothpaste, or god forbid some water. Luckily those get caught, so we’re still safe.
It’s a shit job with shit pay to deal with assholes all day and you don’t even know if you’ll get that shit pay if congress can’t come up with a deal every few months. I don’t blame them.
I blame them. I see people doing literal shit jobs (cleaning bathrooms) every day for shittier pay and they even have a smile in their faces from time to time. They definitely don’t go out of their way to be assholes to everyone around them and spread their misery.
It’s an organization culture thing. I’ve been to airports where they just do their jobs, and I’ve been to ones where they think they’re cops and act accordingly: as bastards.
I have yet to have a TSA person be an asshole to me. Curt, maybe. An asshole, no.
The latest I’ve personally witnessed was one sadistically mishandling an obviously expensive violin to torture the poor girl that was trying to get through X-ray to embark.
That was in Houston, and other people I know that live the say that going through TSA there is always between bad and terrible. I’ve been to Memphis and they were fine.
That honestly sounds more like a texas thing than a TSA thing as sadism is their official state pasttime.
problems literally only americans have. is it really too much to ask to store guns and ammunition safely?
Guns of course not, ammo kinda yeah? It can kinda get everywhere when you go out shooting. If you don’t have strictly segregated bags for international travel vs a bag for going to the range or taking hunting then it’s pretty easy to find old loose ammo in your bag or stuck in your coat when you don’t expect it. I do have a range backpack that also gets used for other hobbies but never travels with me just in case but like, I get it. I’ve more than once had an empty cartridge fall out of a jacket multiple days after last shooting.
Same here, I try not to mix travel bags with bags I carry ammo and weapons in. Rounds and shells have a tendency of getting everywhere. I could totally see how this could happen to anyone who has guns and shoots regularly.
Whoa there, I do believe that’s heresy in the United States. Punishment is a range day with someone entirely too enthusiastic about esoteric gun details like barrel twist.
Fucks sake. Why should they.
I don’t understand how ammo ends up in someone’s luggage. It’s not like people pack their ammo in luggage to go to the gun range. but I know someone that works for TSA and I believe they said finding bullets in luggage is the most common way people get in trouble.
- Take backpack to the range.
- Finish, toss a few leftovers unspent rounds in bag.
- Nine months later go to Turks and Caicos (Bring backpack for hiking).
This typically isn’t people putting it in luggage (like suitcases) but backpacks or other non-dedicated range bags.
You definitely might use the same backpack or tote to go out to the range as to go on a weekend trip. Drive to a hunting holiday with friends, then use the same bags for a trip to Disney with the kids. If you’re going somewhere, you use the bags you have.
I assume hunting trips.
If you’re driving to a multi-day camping/shooting event with friends you’ll pack your suitcase. Sounds very plausible to me.
It’s simple. I don’t need different bags for specific purposes. That’s wasteful. I just use the same bags for range time and travel. Obviously I couldn’t tell you how a whole ass gun gets left in there, but I could see a few accidental rounds or casings.
I got stopped going into Canada and their dog got a hit on my bag in the back of my truck. They accused my wife and I for over an hour of trying to bring weapons into Canada. Told them the dog has a good sniffer and that I frequently use that bag at the range, but that I was in fact just traveling to visit national parks and that if I was bringing in guns to their country it wouldn’t be through a major point of entry and would be in the thousands of miles of semi-unmonitored border.
Just use a separate bag for guns and ammo. It’s not that hard, and you will never mix them up.
Yeah this is psychotic my ammo bag is never used for anything else except ammo. It would never occur to me to take it on vacation. Why would I even want to? I don’t even believe these people.
Exactly. It was one of the first things they told us in the training classes. I still don’t understand why they aren’t mandatory prior to owning a gun.
Or even better, don’t own either! Boom, problem solved!
Make the world a safer place, Turks and Caicos.
12 years seems like a long time, but a couple years of prison for bringing a weapon to a country that has illegalized those weapons and states very clearly that you can be prosecuted for bringing those weapons?
Sure.
There was no weapon.
Oh, thanks, I thought I read the woman had ammunition only, but the four earlier tourists were carrying guns. They were apparently not!
Still, if the airport explicitly tells you not to carry firearm ammunition into the country under penalty of prosecution, and then you carry firearm ammunition into the country, you can’t be shocked by prosecution.
but the four earlier tourists were carrying guns.
Please back this claim up, because I honestly believe it’s completely made up. Because even someone else in this thread points to another case where it was just 4 rounds of ammo.
She got prosecuted for attempting to take the 2 rounds of ammo OUT of the country not IN. Those 2 rounds in cost about 40 cents (for both) here. Assuming they were 9mm rounds, as they are the most popular rounds around.
Downvoted for pointing out the facts. lol. Good job Lemminites!
As an american: no mercy. You should always be looking up whether its legal to transfer weapons when you visit another country.
There is zero evidence that any of these people arrested were intentionally bringing ammo into their country. The woman in the article was actually caught with 2 rounds in her bag when she was leaving the country.
She accidentally had two rounds of loose ammo by the sound of it. She didn’t transfer a weapon.
Doesn’t matter, diligence is still a must.
So you are worried about them smuggling bullets 2 at a time INTO the U.S.? Seems pretty ineffective. This is just advocating for harassing people over doing something stupid with no intent to hurt anyone. They needed to be more responsible, give them a fine. Imprisonment should be recouperating people
This is them smuggling onto foreign soil, no?
No they flew out of the U.S. and TSA missed the bullets. They finished their trip, then they were stopped getting on the plane back to the U.S. They would be smuggling them into the U.S. If they were stopped going to that country, they would have been stopped by TSA and questioned on U.S. soil. For the most part, there isn’t airport security when you get off a plane or switch terminals if you have a layoff
If they got caught with 4 rounds on their way out, then there’s no telling how many they brought with them. A smuggler would be incentivized to downplay and minimize their crime. Maybe that’s why the penalty is so heavy.
If they brought 0 out there is no telling how many they brought in, locking up people for 12 years for a crime they didnt see is ridiculous. Comparison example: Person pulled over driving back into Colorado has a finished roach in his ash tray. Would you think imprisonment for 12 years on the chance that they smuggled pounds of weed to a non-recreational state next door? Or would you say they were an idiot for putting a roach (stray bullets) in a car ashtray (carrying bag) and traveling across a border where it isn’t legal on one side. I’d give that person a fine as well. (Assuming they can pass a DUI test and they weren’t high at the time they were driving).
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“Grier, who was on her way back to Florida when she was detained, appeared in court Thursday, police said. Her next hearing is July 5.”
The TSA also told the news reporters they missed ammo elsewhere in the article. It was all there
I mentioned in another thread how stories like this convinced me to never use the same bag for travel as your daily driver. It made people sad.
Yeah, I made a similar but much less serious mistake doing that. Once.
I hope somebody shows you the same mercy you have shown these people with that comment.
The idea that you just have loose ammo in the folds of your bags instead of crumbs is so insane and also so stereotypical of americans. 12 years is a little much but I have less sympathy since the US constantly locks citizens of other countries away for longer for less dangerous offences.
Like around here if you store ammo inappropriately like this will get your gun license yoinked permanently faster than you can blink. Like the dangerous part of owning guns is the ammo, without it guns are just an ineffective club, and ammo can go off without a gun.
Ammo can go off without a gun, yes, but is significantly less dangerous. The casing just sort of takes off and you have deal with much lower velocity soft casing rather than a bullet. Still can end up with some wounds but the deadliness is practically nullified.
Oh you sweet summer child. When I was in college, my lacrosse team was traveling for an away game. My teammate forgot he had shotgun shells in his bag. First of all, they didn’t find it until the way BACK. Second, he received no legal punishment.
“Oh you sweet summer child” is such a condescending thing to say.
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The past half century? This happened in 2010
I love this. This is my current favourite part of the timeline where Americans are treated with the same hypocrisy they demand of everyone else globally. Then whine and complain as always, and the other government just doesn’t care. Stay strong Turks and Caicos, makes me want to buy one of your citizenships so much more.
Do you have anything that actually indicates any of these people who have been arrested there demanded that this exact thing happen to everyone else globally? Outside of that, it just reeks of dealing with the cognitive dissonance of thinking you care about justice, but having a vengeful attitude towards Americans, probably because you have a low opinion of America’s politics.
Cool, let me know how their tourism industry turns out after they finish.
I’m sure getting all of this press is worth it if they scare away the people of the richest nation in the western hemisphere that is closest geographically to their tiny islands.
I’m sure they can replace American tourists.
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Lol, you’ve never gone shooting then and it shows. A case of ammo, I can understand but two rounds is nothing and should be a fine and on your way. They aren’t smuggling anything of real value.
I suspect we’ll see a lot more of these stories in the news. If you want to get rid of your SO it would be so easy to send them on a vacation to Grand Turk and drop a few rounds in their suitcase. Bye, Bye wifey for 18 years.
You know one of the reasons why Cuban tourism was then wasn’t then now is so popular? Because Muricans can’t go there. Seriously. People would flock from all over North America, except Murica, to Cuba and get to enjoy a civil holiday devoid of a bunch of angry yelling tourists demanding they do thing a certain correct way.
Countries like this in the world today in 2024, will be just fine. American tourism is declining to the point of irrelevance for everybody but the 1% Americans. The Chinese have the crown but COVID paused their global ambitions. There are many tourists that try to go out of their way to avoid American hotspots when on holiday for good reason.
You decided to use a country that can’t even feed itself and is currently going through the worst economic crisis in it’s history as your example of a success because of a lack of American tourists… Riiigghhhtt
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-68434845
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2024-03-19/communist-cuba-is-on-the-brink-of-collapse
Just like Iran, these issues are caused by the US and economic warfare, ie sanctions. Learn about how your country enables Genocide all over the world before replying again.
Lol, you picked the example using that big brain of yours bro. It’s amazing that you think an absolute failure of a state like Cuba is a shining example of how a Caribbean country survives without American tourists.
Camoflauge clothing is also illegal in some of those small Caribbean countries. Apparently it’s a problem with cruise ship passengers.
If people could read simple pieces of information, things like this would not be an issue.
Why is it so hard to check your fucking luggage before going on a trip?
This is a common hustle. They will try to extort money or will drop a round in your baggage.
Four of the detained Americans have admitted they brought the ammunition — but by mistake.
It appears this isn’t the case.
I wouldn’t trust them if they had a signed video confession. These places operate a certain way and Americans are great for leverage at various levels of government.
How familiar are you with Turks and Caicos? What do you mean by “these places”?
Oh look we got an expert here
