A New York mom vacationing in South Florida was expecting a healthy dose of sun, surf and fun. Imagine her surprise when her daughter unzipped a bag in their rental Nissan Rogue and found a rifle — a big rifle. Looking just like the ones real soldiers use.

Horrified, she immediately called E-Z Rent-A-Car and then drove to the nearest police station.

And there would be one more surprise: The AR-15 semiautomatic had been left behind by model Lauren Tannehill, the wife of Miami Dolphins quarterback Ryan Tannehill.

“We got out of the car, we were kind of freaked out,” Judith Fleissig recalls of the moment this month when she and her daughter found the weapon. “I didn’t want to touch it.”

Fleissig on Jan. 6 turned over the gun to the closest police station, following the rental company’s recommendation, officials said.

Authorities conducted a review and determined it was legally owned and accidentally left behind.

“Though dangerous if it would have landed in the wrong hands, it’s not criminal,” Broward sheriff's spokeswoman Keyla Concepción said. “They simply forgot it.”

Lauren Tannehill, 26, is a model who was featured on HBO's “Hard Knocks,” a reality sports documentary television series. The couple married in January 2012.

A model in possession of an AR-15, the civilian’s version of the military’s M-16, may be incongruous to some. But it shouldn’t surprise Lauren Tannehill’s fans who view postings of her on Twitter.

Pictures on the social media site show her and her husband shooting guns together. Ryan Tannehill, who is from Texas, has often talked about his hunting experiences.

The Tannehills view this as a personal matter, according to a Dolphins spokesman Wednesday.

The gun legally belongs to Ryan Tannehill, and the couple immediately called the rental car company to report a missing item, even though the couple didn’t specify what was in the bag, a football league source said.

According to a sheriff’s report, Lauren Tannehill rented the white Nissan Rogue on Jan. 4 and returned it two hours later to the rental company, E-Z Rent-A-Car at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport. Tannehill swapped it for a different car.

Hours later, the car was rented to Fleissig, 58, of Rochester, N.Y., the sheriff’s report said.

Fleissig said she was in South Florida with her daughter, who was interviewing for a pediatric residency program at the University of Miami, and they decided to make it into a vacation, visiting a friend in Hillsboro Beach.

The seats were folded down when she picked up the SUV, and she never looked in the back because the airline had lost her luggage, she said.

That was late on a Saturday. The next day, she said they didn’t use the car. It wasn’t until two days later when her daughter raised the seats so they could go for a drive with friends when she discovered the bag, Fleissig said.

Thinking they would just call the owner, they searched for an ID, but there was none, she said. Her daughter unzipped the bag and said, “‘Oh my God, it’s a gun.’ I said, ‘I think I’m going to throw up,’” Fleissig said.

Fleissig said she and her daughter jumped out of the car to get away from the gun. “I took a picture, zipped it back up and went to the police station. They came out and took it.”

She said Hillsboro Beach Police Department told her she needed to wait while they checked to make sure it wasn’t a stolen weapon — or they’d need to impound the car.

“[I thought] ‘this vacation is getting better and better,’” she said. The LMT AR-15 rifle was valued at $2,000 in a sheriff’s report. The rifle was equipped with an optical sight, raising its value.

Gun experts say that kind of a rifle shoots one round at a time and a magazine allows for 30 bullets. Upgrades can hold as many as 100, they said.

Justin Lampert, an owner of National Armory, a gun store and gun range in Pompano Beach, said because there are “much better guns for defensive purposes,” this rifle is used mostly for collectors, gun-range enthusiasts and hunting, especially of boars.

There was no word from the rental company about how the rifle stayed behind in the car.

Charlie Graham, vice president of business development for Orlando-based E-Z Rent-A-Car, said cars are cleaned between customers. “That is part of our normal procedures,” he said. “I’m not sure how that could get past.”

A sheriff’s report said Tannehill was instructed to contact Hillsboro Beach police about getting the rifle back.

Hillsboro Beach police did not comment Wednesday, so it was unclear whether the Tannehills have gotten the rifle back. A sheriff’s report didn’t say whether the gun was loaded.

Fleissig said Wednesday she had no clue who Lauren Tannehill — or her husband — were until now.

“Miami Dolphins, yes, I’ve heard of them,” she said. “But I’m not a football fan.”

Staff researcher Barbara Hijek contributed to this report. lhuriash@tribune.com or 954-572-2008

