Originally Posted by
32767a
As others have said, you have to be in compliance with local gun laws at the airport. I've traveled with long guns in checked baggage between relatively rural airports and have never had a problem.
You do want to stay with the TSA until they clear your gun case. They typically will screen it at the "oversize baggage" station. The TSA people I've dealt with have been uniformly nice and helpful, but if they decide they need to open your case, you'll need to be there with your keys.
At your destination, they used to just put them on the baggage belts, but there seems to have been a policy change in the last year or two and your gun will be delivered to the baggage office (or sometimes the oversize baggage belt) and usually require you to actually ask for your item, vs leaving it out.
I have checked my 9mm and my .357 (on separate occasions) before in my luggage with no problems. Granted, the airports I've done this at are in NC, GA, and FL, which are all firearms-friendly states. At any rate, here's what I've had to do, and what I've done beyond that:
1. Checking in: Declare to the ticket agent that I have a gun in my checked luggage. You have to fill out an orange card certifying that the gun is unloaded, and each agent has asked me to open my luggage to verify that the gun is (a) inside a gun case and (b) the case is locked with a padlock. Once the TA is satisfied, I put the orange card in the same compartment with the gun, zip the luggage back up, and then hand it to the TA as normal. I wait in the area until the converyor belt has taken it behind the magic curtain. Once it's there, I have no idea what the TSA does with it.
1A. Checking in, specific to VLD and TLH: Checked luggage screening at these airports occurs landside, not airside. I wait in the area while TSA rifles through (pun intended) my luggage and verify that my gun gets placed back in the luggage securely, the luggage is zipped up, then taken to the appropriate next destination as if there were no gun present.
2. For the padlock, I use a non-TSA-certified, old-school, keyed Master lock.
3. Baggage claim: it's been delivered to the baggage claim belt as if there is nothing out of the ordinary. I have not had to go to a special area to retrieve my luggage.