Transportation Security Administration agents found a Mequon man's loaded handgun Tuesday at a checkpoint at Milwaukee Mitchell International Airport, authorities said.

The .380-caliber semiautomatic handgun, loaded with six bullets, was inside the man's jacket pocket, according to a TSA news release. Agents discovered the gun when the man sent his coat through the X-ray machine.

The man told agents he thought the gun was in a different jacket. Milwaukee County Sheriff's Office deputies questioned him and cited him on state weapons charges, according to the TSA.

The gun was the first one Milwaukee agents found this year. Last year, the TSA recently reported, agents found 16 firearms at the airport. It was up from 2018, when agents found 11 guns.

A total of 4,432 firearms were discovered in carry-on bags or on passengers at checkpoints across the country last year, averaging about 12.1 firearms per day, the TSA said.

That's about a 5% increase nationally in firearm discoveries from 2018.

Of the firearms detected at checkpoints in the U.S., 87% were loaded.

Passengers can travel with firearms provided they are unloaded, declared to the airline and placed in hard-sided and locked checked baggage.

Joe Taschler of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel contributed to this report.

Contact Sophie Carson at (414) 223-5512 or scarson@gannett.com. Follow her on Twitter at @SCarson_News.