TSA Seizes Rocket Launcher …the SECOND This Week

Shutterstock.com/Office of the State Fire Marshal

Here we go again! More military equipment was seized at Baltimore Washington International Airport on Thursday — making it the second such seizure in days.

A rocket launch tube was discovered in the American Airlines baggage area according to the Office of the State’s Fire Marshal’s Bomb Squad. The baggage belonged to a sergeant who was bringing home a souvenir of their service abroad.

Before being flown to the US, the “inert” equipment was inspected by US military officials for safety and was “empty of any explosive hazard,” and that the tube “presents no immediate threat to anyone on the ground,” but noted that “there is a slight chance that it could contain pressurized gas and was therefore not allowed on the Sergeant’s connecting commercial flight.” The bomb squad is holding the rocket launch “until it can be safely returned to the owner.”

Earlier this week a fake grenade and a real missile launcher were found at two different airports. At BWI in Maryland, TSA agents found a different missile launcher in someone else’s checked luggage. The passenger was active military personnel traveling home from Kuwait and wanted to keep the missile launcher as a souvenir. TSA also discovered a grenade at Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey in someone’s checked luggage.

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) would like to remind passengers not to bring explosives, military weapons or devices that shoot explosives on airplanes — even if they’re just replicas.