ThinkPad Battery Explodes at LAX Airport -- Laptop Ban on Planes Inevitable?

I have to answer that before somebody as dumb as you actually tries to put water on a chemical or electrical fire.

All fires still need oxygen to burn. If used correctly, the appropriate fire extinguisher can slow down or extinguish chemical and electrical fires by a combination of immediate cooling and smothering of the air supply. And I think we can assume planes have the appropriate fire extinguishers and the flight attendants have been trained in their use.

From http://www.ilpi.com/safety/extinguishers.html:
# Metal/Sand Extinguishers are for flammable metals (class D fires) and work by simply smothering the fire. The most common extinguishing agent in this class is sodium chloride, but there are a variety of other options. You should have an approved class D unit if you are working with flammable metals. The following types of class D extinguishing units are available through our on-line store, Safety Emporium.

* Sodium chloride (NaCl) works well for metal fires involving magnesium, sodium (spills and in depth), potassium, sodium/potassium alloys, uranium and powdered aluminum. Heat from the fire causes the agent to cake and form a crust that excludes air and dissipates heat.

* Powdered copper metal (Cu metal) is preferred for fires involving lithium and lithium alloys. Developed in conjunction with the U.S. Navy, it is the only known lithium fire fighting agent which will cling to a vertical surface thus making it the preferred agent on three dimensional and flowing fires.

* Graphite-based powders are also designed for use on lithium fires. This agent can also be effective on fires involving high-melting metals such as zirconium and titanium.

 

And a followup:

The National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) classifies fires into five general categories (U.S.):

* Class A fires are ordinary materials like burning paper, lumber, cardboard, plastics etc.

* Class B fires involve flammable or combustible liquids such as gasoline, kerosene, and common organic solvents used in the laboratory.

* Class C fires involve energized electrical equipment, such as appliances, switches, panel boxes, power tools, hot plates and stirrers. Water can be a dangerous extinguishing medium for class C fires because of the risk of electrical shock unless a specialized water mist extinguisher is used.

* Class D fires involve combustible metals, such as magnesium, titanium, potassium and sodium as well as pyrophoric organometallic reagents such as alkyllithiums, Grignards and diethylzinc. These materials burn at high temperatures and will react violently with water, air, and/or other chemicals. Handle with care!!

* Class K fires are kitchen fires. This class was added to the NFPA portable extinguishers Standard 10 in 1998. Kitchen extinguishers installed before June 30, 1998 are "grandfathered" into the standard.


Let's see... flaming lithium-ion battery... Class C and D. What does it say about using water?

 

you guys are looking at this all wrong...this is a GOOD thing

you see, lets say a ban goes into effect. what happens? hmmm...business users will still want to use laptops while in the air (among others)...hopefully airlines will realize that they could just provide power jacks at every seat thus evading the ban - as long as the batteries were removed or if the laptop was one of those that bypassed the battery while on AC the problem would be solved AND it would end up helping everyone

well unless you really need to move it around once seated, lol

then again how hard would it be for a terrorist to start an explosion from an exposed power jack? a copper wire and something flammable could do some damage - but then again these jacks already exist so that isn't a new thing

 

Maybe solid-core thin film batteries will end this mess?

 

I totally understand the inconvenience factor for laptop users if they are no longer allowed to carry on their laptops. I definitely understand the hesitancy to check it with luggage.

But in the end, I don't see the airlines/FAA/NTSB caring much about you or your laptop since the idea would be to avoid panic and major lawsuits if a laptop should cause any injury or damage aboard a flight. I think they'd rather replace your laptop than deal with potential issues. Unfortunately the numbers stack up against us laptop users.

You can sue for every minute you think you're going to die.

I wish these explosions never happened too. This is a huge disappointment for laptop users. I'm just glad that guy got off the plane.

 

Still no corroboration?

 

Yuck. There are people who are better left off to be clothed for sure.

That's aweful regarding the computer ; hope no one was hurt.

 

So if all fires need air to burn how can a flare burn underwater? If there is a fuel supply already (like the chemicals in the battery) using a fire extinguisher is going to do nothing. You did mention special fire extinguishers which Im sure would work, but Im sure thats not what LAX or any airport has readily available for use. Its more like something in a lab where they know they are dealing with the stuff you listed in your post.

And I didnt say to put water on an electical fire. That is the last thing you want to do. But the batteries burning are a chemical fire and without a special extinguisher the next best thing is to cool it down quickly.

 

Your words exactly:

Also, flares don't burn underwater; they float on the surface of water.

-Zadillo

 

Pah, health and safety going overboard. The way this is going we are going to be walking around in bubble rap for the rest of our lives!

Anyone know who makes zepto batteries?

 

if folks don't know FOR SURE what the heck they are talking about with serious issues like this it'd be a heck of a lot better to say nothing rather than give people bad advice

water is NOT a safe or smart solution in the case of fires of a chemical nature -for example in some cases water is an accelerant - burning magnesium for example explodes or flares - burning hotter - when exposed to water

the FAA is aware of and both researching and monitoring the issue - but in a rare example of common sense and a government agency simply note the risk exists with all batteries and the threat from a single battery is small

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2004018,00.asp

 

Are you guys sure all of the exploding batteries were from Sony?
When is the bad press about them gonna end? I feel really bad for them right now.

 

Exaclty what im waiting for as well...makes me begin to doubt the validity of this "story"

 

Yes those are my words, but you should read the next sentance, its not an electrical fire. Just because its an electrical component that is on fire, does not make it an electrical fire. And flares do burn under water, regardless of whether it floats on its own or not. How about if you hold it under water, well it still burns doesnt it.

So we have established that in some cases water is bad for the chemical fires, but there hasnt been anything showing that this is the case for the chemicals in these specific batteries. So besides a specific fire exstinguisher that is made for this type of chemical fire, what is the next best thing to do?

 

I've owned/used T42/T43/T60's at work and at home as a personal laptop, and they are all Sanyo batteries. The laptop that caught fire also looks like a T4X chassis. I believe it is Sanyo, NOT Sony....who came up with this idea anyway?

 

hmmm... my Z61m uses a SANYO battery.

 

my T60 (6 cells) uses a Sony.

 

I don't know why mainstream media never picked it up, it's one of those things you'd think would be reported but if nobody notified media and it wasn't considered a "big deal" at the time then it definitely could just go by the wayside and not get mentioned.

A commenter on Engadget verifies this: http://www.engadget.com/2006/09/16/thinkpad-explodes-at-lax-ignites-bomb-scare/#comments although he does say it happened on Friday at Gate 77 and not on Saturday (check out comment at 3:02p.m. on Saturday by James). Apparently not much of a deal was made of it at the terminal.

In addition, the guy that owned the laptop confirmed it was a ThinkPad T43: http://www.engadget.com/2006/09/16/thinkpad-explodes-at-lax-ignites-bomb-scare/comments/2126484/

Also, the pictures aren't photoshopped and it doesn't sound terribly far fetched or someone just trying to get attention.

 

"Short-lived" ban on gels and liquids? As of my weekend trip, they're still banned on U.S. flights. Either that, or the word hasn't gotten out to the folks at the airports in Columbus, Chicago, Tulsa, or Dallas.

 

My X60 uses a Sony battery. Whew.. at least some burden is lifted off my sholders. Not an X60 yes! Now back to the fact that th ebattery I use might be defected anyway.

 

I dont get how a notebook battery explodes when the laptop was off.

 

When the negative or positive voltage jumps the divider because of contaminated metal bits inside the battery. The battery still has power stored and when negative goes with positive, BOOM. :\

 

You should quit before you make a greater fool of yourself.

A fire in a chemical battery that is still electrically connected to your computer would count as an electrical fire for the purposes of this discussion, which is about not putting water on things that are conducting voltages.

Second, underwater flares supply their own oxygen:
http://van.physics.uiuc.edu/qa/listing.php?id=1549

"The flare has to have both the material that burns (usually magnesium, which burns very brightly), and oxygen. There are signal flares that burn underwater -- one was recently used very visibly for the 2004 Olympic Torch. A company in Australia made a specially formulated flare which supplies its own oxygen at enough pressure to keep the water out while the flare burns. The pressure may not be much of an issue on the moon (but the oxygen has to be present at a high enough pressure to allow the combustible material to burn). You can even imagine a flare made of a compressed tank of oxygen, a nozzle, and an ordinary flare. These will burn as long as the ordinary flare would burn and the oxygen supply lasts (or may even burn longer if the oxygen is supplied more slowly, but would burn less bright). You can always make one that burns longer by making it bigger, with more combustible materials. Of course you have to arrange it so it doesn’t all burn at once (an explosion). The underwater olympic torch was designed to burn for about 3 minutes underwater. "

Same answer here:
http://www.ccmr.cornell.edu/education/ask/index.html?quid=202
"Thank you for your question about underwater cutting torches. The first thing you must realize is that a flame requires a combustible substance and an oxidizer. In the case of a candle flame, the combustible substance is the heated wax which rises up the candle wick and is vaporized by the heat of the flame. The oxidizer is the oxygen in the surrounding atmosphere. These two ingredients can sustain a candle flame.
In the case of an underwater torch, both the combustible substance and the oxidizer must be supplied by hoses leading down to the torch, since no free oxygen is available underwater. The combustible gas, which might be hydrogen or acetylene, depending on the application, can be combined with oxygen gas (the oxidizer) to produce an underwater flame at the tip of the torch."

 

Do we have to argue about fire extinguishing techniques? I mean, I wanted to be a firefighter when I was a tiny kid (not anymore), I just wouldn't think to find info about it on a notebook discussion board.

 

Considering that someone here could take dangerously bad advice about how to deal with an electrical or chemical fire based on what has been posted here.... yeah, I think it is worth being discussed.