Flying with Edibles & Bringing Weed On A Plane

We at OaklandMofo are NOT suggesting you attempt to work your way around or break any local laws. This information provided is based on the TSA.gov official ruling on flying with edibles or weed in checked bags or carry-on luggage. Because laws in most states are geared towards medical marijuana and now recreational marijuana, people ask if you can legally bring weed or edibles on an airplane or even sneak it on a plane without a medical card. Technically, yes, per the Transportation Security Agency Government website, just put it in your carry-on bag with your medical card. That’s it, and you don’t have to get creative.

You do not want to put it in your checked bag because they do random searches with checked luggage. Legally, you MUST check with your local or federal laws.

Edibles and Others Should Go In Carry-On Bag

Edibles are fine in carry-on, they do not smell. But “other” should be put it something like an Airport Security approved smell proof bag. They are easily available on Amazon. Then just throw it in with your clothes, socks, underwear, whatever. You can see from the airport security scanner image and the testimonials that it won’t show up in the x-ray machine.
Amazon Review

One extremely important thing to remember is never to put a vape pen in your checked bag. They have batteries that can not go in the airplane compartment due to possible explosion/fire hazards. This is why so many electronics must only be shipped via Ground Mail. To avoid the underbelly of a plane.

Can you bring weed/edibles on a plane?

Legally, the TSA does not enforce federal laws or search for drugs. They do allow you to bring certain medical marijuana products on the plane. However, they do not search for any drugs or enforce local or federal laws for any type of marijuana. They can only call your local police department, where it may be legal. As for edibles, they won’t even know what they are looking at if they see them but the same rules apply. You must keep in mind that a pot brownie, aka edible in checked bags, looks just like a regular brownie, and this is not of their concern.
Source: TSA
They say, “The final decision rests with the TSA officer on whether an item is allowed through the checkpoint.”

Flying With Edibles, Or Marijuana / Weed

Buy Smell Proof Bag

How you can you get past the TSA?
Airport Security can be a scary barrier to penetrate, but it’s extremely easy to just put weed in your carry-on bag with your medical card. Yes, that’s right, simply put it in your bag and forget about it. But it must be in your carryon, do not put it in your normal checked-in luggage or suitcase under the plane in the cargo bay. The TSA does randomly search checked luggage before loading it onto the flight. Also, no plastic bottles.

Legal Note: I am not promoting illegal drug smuggling by any means. I assume you have a medical card, making marijuana legal for you or living in a state where recreational marijuana is legal, such as California, Oregon, Washington, Nevada, or Colorado. This article is for information or for educational purposes. For instance, in Oregon, where it is legal statewide, police will not stop you. But only inside Oregon. Portland police could care less about weed and the TSA is not even going to bother calling them to waste their time. It’s fully legal in the state. While Federal laws still do not allow you to travel to other states with recreational marijuana, your state and local TSA may not care at all. They are not even looking for some random person flying with marijuana or a pot brownie. But you must follow the airline rules with whom you have booked a flight with.

As for the Airport X-Ray Scanners? Marijuana and edibles are both organic materials and are not going to raise any eyebrows as a weapon would. They will look like anything else, such as socks, ramen noodles, a random food gift, etc. Flying with marijuana, hash oils, dab wax, hash, vape cartridges, edible food, is all the same. You can also fly with vaporizers in your carry-on bag. You can also fly with edibles in your bags, which may be the easiest. It is all organic material.

How to bring weed on a plane. Bringing weed on the plane
If you are a legal Medical Card carrier, then yes, you can transport a personal amount of legalized medical marijuana, but you better have your valid, verifiable card on you because if you can not prove this, the marijuana will be confiscated by local law authorities(if they are bored that day) and you will get a ticket and a court date in that city for possession of marijuana. This can depend on your state though. There are still states that will jail you for carrying marijuana as if it is a hardcore narcotic. Keep in mind we’re talking about medical states and legal states and following your local laws.

In a medical state, it has been said if you are caught without a card, they will take the weed, give you a ticket and let you catch your flight with no jail time. So far, all reports I have seen state that they will not make you miss your flight over a little pot, card, or not. Especially in a place like Colorado, Washington, Oregon, Nevada, and now California. All states where marijuana is legal by state law for recreational use. States like California’s airports such as Oakland International Airport, San Francisco International, Los Angeles International Airport.

The easiest way to not deal with airport security scanners checking your bags is to just not tell them you have weed. If you are doing this legally, there is no need to bring it up. Put it in your carry-on bag, inside something smell-proof or vacuum sealed, a baggie, in a sock if you’re paranoid and forget about it. The drug dogs are not trained for marijuana, but this is a precaution because some good dank weed can be smelt by those around you if not sealed properly. The TSA security officers do not open your carry-on, and the x-ray scanner cannot see medical cannabis or edibles because they are organic material like everything else in your luggage and will show up as orange nothing. Don’t try and get clever and hide it in something like a shampoo bottle. You have to be careful with things like shampoo bottles because the FAA actually only allows for you to bring bottles up to 3.4 ounces in your carry-on luggage. Be sure to check federal flying laws.

How The TSA Handles Marijuana:
If the TSA officer at your airport finds weed in your suitcase, they will not be able to do anything. They hold no power. They can choose to report you to the local authorities. That being said, Oakland Police(or San Francisco PD) handle marijuana laws loosely. You are fine with a valid California state-issued card because they follow state laws, not federal laws. From what I gather it must be CA State Verified and not some local medical club or doctors note. This also does not work in all California cities. I hear Los Angeles LAX is also run under these guidelines, but you may want to check how their security officers handle medical or recreational cannabis. Update: This has changed for California, weed is now legal, and you do not need a medical card to legally carry it on you. Local laws enforcers will not harass you, and TSA is not searching for marijuana.

Do checked bags get searched for drugs?

Yes, checked bags undergo random searches, which is why you want to put them in your carry-on.

Hide It In Your Carry On Bag
It is recommended that you do NOT tell Airport Security or the TSA Agents that you have medical marijuana on you. Why go through the hassle if you can just sneak it on the airplane? They never find it, and they do not even search for it. You should put it discreetly in your carry-on luggage and keep the card on you at all times so you may produce it to Airport Security Searches if needed. Honestly, the chances of the TSA agents finding a small amount of weed in your carry-on bag is very slim. Many reported that you could just put your pot in an airtight bag and put it with your socks or something. Don’t overthink it.

The TSA states they are not even searching for marijuana and don’t care. Even if they do accidentally find it, there is a chance they will not even alert local police officers in the current airport. It is a lot of work, and they know it will result in nothing or a small ticket. They do not “search” for it, I think, mainly because it shows up is an organic orange color in the scanner and is mostly invisible unless you try to hide it in something nonorganic. Blue would be synthetics like plastic, black metals, and green is more like thin plastics. Either way, most of the scan is orange, all organic materials. Notice you can’t see any clothes, socks, pants or shirts? It’s all orange. Because marijuana and edibles are organic, they appear orange and therefore invisible. Don’t go hiding it in a metal or plastic tube. Use something smell-proof, but if you see a drug-sniffing dog at the airport, they are trained in one thing only, explosives. Not your tiny amount of medical weed. If it is an international airport, they may be trained for cocaine as well.

Don’t Trigger A Search!
No liquids! These raise suspicion so just don’t. No open jars/bottles of shampoos. You can bring your toiletries but use the TSA rules, put them in a separate clear bag, remove it from your carry on bag and put it in the bin so it does not trigger a search of your bag, or just put them in your checked baggage that goes under the plane. No laptops in your bag(this will get your bag opened up right there). They will remind you but take your laptop out and set it to the side of your bag or under it. However, they do not require you to take out your tablet so you could leave that in as a clutter distraction. I did forget to take my laptop out of my bag and the TSA officers made me go back through the scanner only to find nothing.

Flying With Edibles / Marijuana Food

Here, we are on a whole new level. The same rules apply when trying to sneak a pot cookie, brownie, gummy bears, or any THC concentrates on a plane. This is even easier because it is just food, a snack, that’s that. It will not show up, just like when you took normal non-weed food on a flight last time. The only difference is it now has marijuana in the brownie. They can’t tell. But some people need reassurance that you can fly with edibles such as pot brownies or gummy bears. In this case, it is even easier. It looks like food people! Just put it in your carry-on bag, once in your assigned seat, pull it out and eat it! In front of them! Joking, do not break any laws, but no one can tell you if a cookie, brownie, gummy bear, or chocolate bar is laced with marijuana or not. Do not be paranoid. It may help if you have normal packaging and not some crazy weed leaves and medical wording. As for dabs, wrap them up, stuff them in a sock. Hash? Same thing. Treat it like normal flower buds. Read the above article and the comments below for people’s experiences flying with weed and sneaking edibles in an airport.

Flying With Vape Pens / Vaporizers / Hash Oil Pens

If you plan on flying with a vaporizer, you must put it in your carry-on luggage. The TSA does not allow you to put the vape pen batteries in your checked luggage below the plane. There are too many poorly manufactured tank systems with low-quality batteries that could catch fire on the plane. So, bring it all with you in your luggage like normal.

Source: TSA

Marijuana Legal In Several States

Of course now it’s completely legal in several US States and you don’t even have to worry about concealing it. But you still can / should because why go through the trouble?

Cannabis Legal States

1. Alaska
2. California
3. Colorado
4. Main
5. Massachusetts
6. Nevada
7. Oregon
8. Washington

Medically Legal States

• Arizona
• Arkansas
• California
• Connecticut
• Delaware
• Florida
• Hawaii
• Illinois
• Louisiana
• Main
• Maryland
• Minnesota
• Mississippi
• Montana
• Nevada
• North Dakota
• New Hampshire
• New Jersey
• New Mexico
• New York
• Ohio
• Oklahoma
• Pennsylvania
• Rhode Island
• Vermont

Decriminalized States

• Connecticut
• Washington DC

Source
So as you can see, flying with weed just about anywhere is no big risk anyway.

Drug Smuggling In Oakland?
There have been some major bust(by random search chance) coming out of the Bay Area Airports. A recent one was 81 pounds!
If this is happening then you know it’s getting through all of the time undetected in large amounts. So fear not, follow the guidelines and fly high!

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Landing In Another Airport With Weed?
Remember, just because you got on the flight at OAK, SFO or LAX does not mean the airport you landed in(or state) allows for medical marijuana so be very careful not to break the law. Luckily I have not heard anything about people getting searched on the way out of an airport so you should be fine.

Drug Smuggling Via DHL

Note: We highly suggest you follow your locallaws, federal laws and rules of the airline you booked with. I am not claiming to be a final verdict or a set of laws regarding this topic and hold no legal responsibilities for your actions. This is just the information that I myself have come to conclusion with based on a lot of research including fieldwork studies put with online information.

Please comment below if you have more to add to the topic or your own personal experience with Airport Security. Specifically, if you have flown with weed on an International Flight from say Canada, United Kingdom, Asia, China or anywhere overseas.
Do not comment asking if you can sneak weed on an airplane one way or another. Read the article and comments for that answer.

And now for some of our favorite search terms that landed people on this article about flying with marijuana!

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