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So you're ready to go to that firearms school you read so much about, there are still a few seats left in the class you wanted and it's even being offered in a state where your CCW will be recognized. The only question now is do you fly or drive? If you drive you'll maintain possession of your firearm the entire time, but that also means 2 days on the road. What will happen if you fly and are the airlines prepared for you and your side arm. Well luckily your not the first to fly with a handgun and the rules have improved over the last few years (no more "steal me" stickers).
Well the FAA has their set of rules such as Federal Aviation Regulations (FARs) parts 107 section 21 and 108 section 11. At the same time, since the airlines must comply with these regulations they add their own requirements to help them manage the process. The good new is that you can take it with you provided you follow the rules. The question still stands concerning whether you want to hand you gun over to a stranger in hopes of seeing it on the other end.
Here are some general guide lines as I understand them:
General Guidelines
 | Declare you handgun at the airline counter (before you go throught the security check). |
| You will need to dhow that it is unloaded (unload it before you get to the counter, better yet before you leave home). |
| It should be in a hard case, lockable suitcase. |
| Hard lockable inside case inside the suit case. |
| A trigger lock is a nice touch, that way if it does get stolen you won't get shot with it at the airport. |
| There may be a limit on the number of guns. |
| No more than 11lbs. of ammo, some airlines may require less. |
| Ammo should be in a second suitcase. |
| You will need to sign some paper work. |
| Notification on the inside of the suitcase NOT the outside, i.e. no external stickers |
From articles written by folks who travel with their weapon more than I ever will, I get the impression that problems do happen, usually due to airline employees who don't know the rules. There is an excellent article covering this topic, including some case studies published in the March 2000 Combat Handguns entitled "Weapons and Airlines" by Massad Ayoob. In any case this is your decision to make. To help you do that here are some links to domestic airlines that publish their policy. These links may take you into their baggage/sports section and you then have to scroll down until you find topics like hunting or firearms.
| Continental Airlines (my favorite) |
| Delta (another favorite) |
| Midwest |
| Soutwest |
| TWA |
| United Airlines |
The airlines that have been listed here should be applauded for making this information readily available to their travelers. If your airline is not listed here it may just be that they did not have a page list when I was looking or it was too hard to find or they are a regional airline that I am not familiar with or any number of reasons. In any case here are a few links to sites that list every web site of every airline ever placed on the web. I list 3 here because, like me, they might have missed one
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State CCW Pages on the Web |
