Colorado Politics

Paging airline passengers: You left $926,030.44 in cash at TSA checkpoints

Those plastic bins at airport security checkpoints where you deposit your valuables for screening are doubling as bank teller windows for the Transportation Security Administration.

Passengers left behind nearly $1 million at airport security checkpoints during fiscal year 2019, which ended last Oct. 1, according to a newly released report by the TSA.

Officers collected $926,030.44 in U.S. currency and $18,899.09 in foreign currency that was left behind in the form of coins and cash from Oct. 1, 2018, through Sept. 30, 2019.

Bustling New Yorkers sprinting through of John F. Kennedy International Airport forgot the most money, nearly $100,000. The runners-up were San Francisco International Airport, Miami International Airport, McCarran International Airport in Las Vegas, and Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport. Each collected $40,000 to $53,000.

Colorado’s commercial airports were 14th in the nation with $21,501.47 left behind, the TSA reports. A spokeswoman noted that the agency does not break down amounts from airports in Alamosa, Aspen, Cortez, Colorado Springs, Denver, Durango, Eagle, Fort Collins, Grand Junction, Gunnison, Hayden, Montrose, Pueblo and Telluride, but the “vast majority” of unclaimed money came from Denver International Airport.

There are signs that the national rate of airport pecuniary carelessness is on the decline. The TSA’s cash haul was down from fiscal year 2018, when officers found $960,105.

The TSA believes that people emptying their pockets often forget they put change or currency in a bin and fail to retrieve it after they have gone through the body scanning machine. It recommends travelers to put that loose change into their carry-on bags or purses before sending the items through the X-ray machine.

The free money, however, is neither handed out to employees nor put toward an airport bar happy hour for the officers who found it. The Department of Homeland Security is required to turn over every penny, and it is put into a special fund for critical aviation security programs.

Cash is not the only thing found or left behind in carry-on or checked baggage, of course. More than 4,400 guns were discovered in 2019 on passengers attempting to get through airport security checkpoints on their way to board U.S. flights, and a staggering 7 out of every 8 were loaded.

“The continued increase in the number of firearms that travelers bring to airport checkpoints is deeply troubling,” TSA Administrator David Pekoske said in a statement at the time.

Gun seizures were up by nearly 200 from 2018, and they have increased every year since 2008, according to federal data. Colorado Politics reported in February that security officials discovered 140 guns in carry-on bags at DIA in 2019.

Passengers attempted to bring tens of thousands of banned items other than guns with them through security, including grenades, fireworks and lipstick knives.

Colorado Politics contributed to this article.

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