This laptop travel ban makes me feel less safe as a frequent flyer - here is why

[auskiwiflyer]

This laptop travel ban makes me feel less safe as a frequent flyer

How many times have you been using your laptop in the airport or at home and when you finish what you are doing you close the screen to put the laptop to sleep then sometime later you take the laptop out and discover it's burning hot almost to the point of catching fire inside your laptop bag? This is because it did not go to sleep as you thought it would and has furiously been trying to keep itself cool in a very well insulated environment.

I have no doubt that this situation could lead to laptop batteries igniting, because when this has happened to me in the past my laptop is been too hot to touch.

Because of this, I worry when flying that my laptop may not be shut down properly and so I always double check before boarding a flight that it is not on or warm.

Before this ban, I had comfort in the knowledge that should someone else not be so diligent, at least the fact that the laptop is in the cabin with the passengers all around would likely mean a fire is detected and extinguished before getting out of control.

By this ban, Trump is suddenly putting most laptops inside cargo holds. Make no mistake a significant number of these will not shut down as assumed when their screens are closed by their owners, and this will result in hundreds of laptops a day being flown around the world at temperatures above 100°C inside cargo holds.

Hopefully this will result in users arriving at their destination simply with a flat battery when they knew that it was fully charged before the flight, but my very legitimate fear is that the risk of a plane being brought down by fire in the hold is many multiples times higher than the likelihood of a terrorist bomb being an in a laptop carried in the cabin.

A380s hold 450+ passengers and I would say at least 50% of those would have either a tablet or laptop with them, so I ask you, which feels safer. An A380 with 220 or more Laptops & Tablets hidden away in the cargo hold or one with these 220 or more devices in seat pockets, overhead bins or on tray tables in close proximity to human noses and eyes?

There are plenty of other reasons why this ban is ill conceived, but this one, surely cannot be overlooked by anyone with common sense. After all, there is a reason why (rightly so) airlines ask you at check in if your checked baggage has any lithium ion batteries, they are a known fire hazard.

 

[auskiwiflyer]

Further, within 5 minutes of posting the above I stumble across..

ATSB: "Mobile and other electronic devices such as phones, laptops, watches and cameras containing low power lithium or lithium-ion batteries should be included in carry-on baggage only—not checked-in baggage."

https://www.atsb.gov.au/newsroom/news-items/2016/aviation-incident-sparks-lithium-battery-warning/

 

[andy2015]

Cargo holds have smoke detectors and fire suppression.

 

[auskiwiflyer]

Cargo holds have smoke detectors and fire suppression.

I don't doubt that, but why then do all airlines I am aware of, and bodies like the ATSB tell you to not carry LiOn batteries in the cargo hold. I guess because detection/supression technology while good, won't better human senses as far as detecting a fire.

 

[andy2015]

I don't doubt that, but why then do all airlines I am aware of, and bodies like the ATSB tell you to not carry LiOn batteries in the cargo hold. I guess because detection/supression technology while good, won't better human senses as far as detecting a fire.

Because that is the ideal arrangement where a fire in the cargo hold would cause an emergency diversion. However with intelligence of a threat to use a bomb hidden in a laptop the risk profile flips to preferable for a fire to occur in the cargo hold and divert than for an explosion in the passenger compartment which can be positioned however the person pleases (say against the fuselage). Add to that the already very tiny chance of a laptop self-combusting...

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Cargo holds have smoke detectors and fire suppression.

If those systems work. No guarantees they will, or that they will be strong enough to extinguish a fire which is subsequently fed by other batteries close by.

 

[jb747]

Cargo holds have smoke detectors and fire suppression.

Funny then that I consider a cargo hold fire to be the most dangerous possible event on an aircraft.....

 

[moa999]

So is the preferred outcome to ban laptops/electronic devices entirely?

Whether its a laptop battery that's thrown in by baggage handlers too hard or something more nefarious, sounds like we'd we better off without them in the hold.

 

[Skyring]

Funny then that I consider a cargo hold fire to be the most dangerous possible event on an aircraft.....

I wouldn't have rated these as the number one priority - because I have no relevant experience or knowledge - but even I can see several ways that a cargo hold fire could have a catastrophic effect. For one thing, it's inaccessible, and whatever fire suppression systems are available may be in the wrong place or unable to contain a fire. Another problem would be that there are some critical systems, such as fuel lines, hydraulics, landing gear, down there.

It's also within the same pressure tube as the cabin, and fumes and smoke and heat will inevitably get to the passengers. Without a close (and suitable) landing field, things could escalate and problems cascade.

At least in the cabin a fire can be addressed directly, and there are fewer critical systems to be affected. The plane can fly on even if a bank of overhead lockers are nothing but charred plastic. Patch up the passengers, hand around a few Panadol, head for Honolulu - or Mumbai or wherever.

From a different direction, security guru Bruce Schneier comments. Hardly a surprise that he sees it as bone-headed, and without any obvious reason or strategy behind the new ban, he sees its main effect as raising distrust of government aviation regulation.

I'd like to think that the folk at the top are reasonably competent, but it seems to me that the safety benefit of this latest ban is pretty marginal. Probably negative.

Instead of being in the cabin, laptops and larger electronics with larger batteries are going to be checked in. That'd be a couple of hundred devices, minimum, some still cooking away. The chance of a cargo fire has just been increased dramatically, and it's just a matter of time now.