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Are lithium-ion batteries the next threat to airline safety?
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A ithium-ion cellphone battery.
By H. Darr Beiser, USA TODAY
A ithium-ion cellphone battery.
Worried about a possible terrorist strike, American Airlines flight attendants confiscated 58 cellphones, lithium-ion batteries and charging devices from a passenger on a June 23 New York flight to Buenos Aires.

In April, Tokyo police and fire officials rushed to a baggage area at Narita airport after a curling iron powered by a lithium-ion battery caused a passenger's checked bag to burst into flames as it was being shuttled from an American Airlines jet to a connecting flight.

Lithium-ion batteries — the rechargeable energy source for cellphones, laptop computers and an increasing number of other portable electronic devices — are becoming a growing concern for airlines in passenger cabins and cargo holds. Non-rechargeable lithium metal batteries like those in cameras and flashlights are a concern, too.

When a lithium battery short-circuits or overheats, it can catch fire or explode. The fire it causes may not be as easy to extinguish as a normal combustion fire.

FAA data show that from March 20, 1991, through Aug. 3, 2010, batteries and battery-powered devices were involved in 113 incidents with "smoke, fire, extreme heat or explosion" on passenger and cargo planes. The data are for lithium and non-lithium batteries and are not a complete list of such incidents, the agency says.

In January, the Transportation Department proposed stricter rules for companies that ship lithium batteries in cargo holds. "The frequency of incidents, combined with the difficulty in extinguishing lithium-battery fires, warrants taking strong action," Rep. Jerry Costello, D-Ill., chairman of the House aviation subcommittee, said of the Transportation Department's proposal.

Lithium-battery experts, security analysts and flight attendants wonder, though, if stricter rules are also needed in airline passenger cabins to prevent fires or worse: a possible attempt by a terrorist to bring down a plane by rigging a large number of batteries together to start a fire.

Right now, there's no limit to how many small lithium-ion batteries a passenger can carry aboard a flight.

Transportation Security Administration spokeswoman Kristin Lee says the agency has studied the matter. She says the TSA, which oversees air security, determined that lithium-ion batteries for cellphones, laptops and cameras "cannot be used as an explosive and are not a security threat in personal carry-on quantities."

But some scientists who have studied the batteries raise doubts about the safety of the ones passengers carry on board flights in their electronic devices, even those as small as those used to power cellphones.

Jian Xie, a mechanical engineering professor at Indiana University-Purdue University-Indianapolis, says portable electronic devices are "pretty safe" for consumers. But, he says, they could be rigged together for a bomb.

That's what worried the attendants aboard the American Airlines flight to Buenos Aires in June. The passenger, who spent more than 30 minutes in a lavatory and acted suspiciously earlier in the flight, began removing batteries from cellphones and had many batteries, cellphones and charging devices on a tray table. Flight attendants reported his actions to the captain and were told to confiscate the devices.

Xie, who is doing lithium-ion battery research for the military, says it's "scary" that a passenger with 50 or so electronic devices, including numerous lithium-ion batteries for cellphones and laptops, boarded an aircraft. "I would be very uncomfortable on that flight," he says.

Amy Prieto, a Colorado State University chemistry professor who also is a lithium-battery expert, says several batteries could start fires that would be difficult to put out. But, she says, even 50 batteries rigged together "wouldn't be like a bomb that would take down a plane."

Dan Abraham, a materials scientist at the Argonne National Laboratory in Illinois, says even a single cellphone battery could start a fire. "A smart terrorist can start fires with these things," he says. "Any energy-storage device packs a lot of energy in a small space and can be used for good or evil."

Special precautions?

Former FAA security director Billie Vincent says TSA screeners need to use common sense and call a supervisor when they see a passenger with many batteries and electronic devices.

"Why is someone carrying so many batteries?" Vincent says. "If there's a need for special packaging for batteries in the cargo hold, why are there not special precautions in the passenger cabin?"

Dinkar Mokadam of the Association of Flight Attendants, which represents more than 50,000 flight attendants at 22 airlines, says a rule should be established to limit the number of devices a passenger carries on board. Such regulations aren't implemented "unless something catastrophic occurs," he says.

Despite the June incident, American Airlines hasn't taken a public position on the quantity of batteries passengers can bring on board, says spokesman Tim Smith. However, Smith says, the crew on the Buenos Aires flight "did exactly as they are trained to do." They observed suspicious behavior and acted on it by confiscating the passenger's phones and batteries, he says. The devices were turned over to "Argentinean authorities," who determined the passenger wasn't a security concern but intended to sell them in Argentina.

Carrying lithium-ion batteries on an aircraft is "mostly" a hazardous materials issue for the Federal Aviation Administration, says Adam Comis, press secretary for the House Committee on Homeland Security.

The FAA, which regulates flight safety, classifies lithium batteries as hazardous materials because they "present chemical and electrical hazards" and are a fire risk.

There have been several recalls of lithium-ion batteries used in laptops and other consumer products "that could spontaneously overheat and cause a fire," FAA spokeswoman Sasha Johnson says.

But the FAA and its parent agency, the Transportation Department, do not limit the number of lithium-ion batteries for laptops, cellphones and some other portable electronic devices that passengers carry aboard. There is a limit for other lithium batteries with higher lithium content.

Since April 1999 — when a shipment of lithium batteries caught fire after being taken out of a passenger plane's cargo hold at Los Angeles airport — the FAA has received reports of 40 fires involving lithium batteries and devices powered by them, Johnson says.

The reports include:

•On Sept. 9, 2009, a battery owned by American Airlines for use by passengers dropped during a flight and caught fire.

•On Aug. 8, 2008, a passenger on an American flight from Washington to Dallas noticed his laptop was smoking. The passenger removed the battery pack and gave it to a flight attendant. The flight attendant placed the battery in a coffee pot in the aft gallery and poured water and Sprite on it.

•On March 4, 2008, a passenger's video display device for viewing entertainment systems emitted a "10-inch plume of sparks and debris" on a United Airlines flight from Chicago to Tokyo. The captain doused the device with water. A small area of the carpet in the passenger cabin was damaged.

No spare batteries

FAA concerns about the fire risks of lithium-ion and lithium-metal batteries are so great that passengers aren't allowed to put spare ones in checked bags. They can, however, put them in checked bags if they are attached to an electronic device.

The Transportation Department in January proposed that shipments by manufacturers and distributors of batteries for laptops, cellphones and many other portable devices be included in stringent hazardous materials rules for cargo holds.

Battery manufacturers must retain results of design and safety tests, and their batteries must be more safely packaged and more safely stored on aircraft, the rule says.

In passenger planes, they would have to be stored in more fire-resistant cargo compartments with fire-extinguishing systems. In FedEx and other cargo planes, they'd have to be stored in areas accessible to pilots in the event of a fire.

A shipment of lithium-ion batteries caught fire as it was being loaded onto a FedEx jet at the company's Memphis hub in August 2004. The National Transportation Safety Board, which investigates air accidents, said the probable cause was unapproved packaging used by the shipper, AC Propulsion. The packaging "was inadequate" to protect the lithium, the NTSB said.

Lithium-ion batteries were inside cargo containers when a cargo hold fire destroyed a UPS jet at Philadelphia airport in February 2006.

The NTSB said it couldn't determine what started the fire, but the fire most likely began in one of three cargo containers that contained lithium-ion batteries, laptop computers and other electronic devices.

The trade association for lithium-ion battery manufacturers says that it's very concerned about safety, and that the batteries "present minuscule fire initiation risk."

Battery and electrical equipment makers oppose the proposed Transportation Department rules. They say the rules are costly and more onerous than those of the International Civil Aviation Organization, which sets standards for 190 countries' aviation authorities.

A restriction on storage of batteries in cargo planes may result in greater quantities being shipped on passenger planes, says George Kerchner, executive director of The Portable Rechargeable Battery Association.

The Airline Pilots Association, which represents nearly 53,000 pilots at U.S. and Canadian airlines, says the proposed rules will make flying safer for passengers and flight crews.

The union would "like to see the fastest implementation of the new rule," says Mark Rogers, the union's dangerous goods expert.

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