Airport security screeners are still confiscating about 22,000 lighters each day, but soon they won't have to take them -- and travelers won't have to give them up.
The Transportation Security Administration, in what it called a "common sense, risk-based security decision," is lifting its ban on "common" lighters in carry-on luggage as of Aug. 4.
The TSA will still ban the "torch lighters" that people often use for pipes and cigars. Those lighters have a consistent stream of air-propelled fire with a thin, needle-like flame that is hotter and more intense than the flame on common lighters, and have long been banned as a hazardous material.
Most lighters, however, are of the common butane type.
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