You can't extrapolate from the two facts of "2,653 firearms discovered by TSA" and "undercover TSA agents managed to smuggle concealed guns and bombs past secur

You can't extrapolate from the two facts of "2,653 firearms discovered by TSA" and "undercover TSA agents managed to smuggle concealed guns and bombs past security 96% of the time" to an expectation that some ~63,500 total firearms were not detected because it is likely that many if not most of the firearm discoveries were not attempts to smuggle the firearm onto the flight. It is not especially uncommon for someone who routinely carries a weapon or other non-TSA-approved item in his or her purse or briefcase to forget to remove it when flying. I've done this twice with a Leatherman multi-tool (among its tools are a pocketknife blade that is obviously not TSA-approved) that I used to keep in my laptop bag. In areas where guns may be carried, this happens with guns. In these cases, the travelers had simply forgotten to remove the weapon or unapproved item and were not attempting to smuggle it onto the flight. When it's pretty clear that there was no intent to smuggle the item onto the flight, the traveler is generally asked to remove the item and there is typically no penalty. I was asked to return the Leatherman to my car or pay to have it Fedex'ed back to my house.