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Old 23rd Feb 2011, 07:56
  #56 (permalink)  
PBL
 
Join Date: Sep 2000
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I think that, to get taken a little more seriously, craftmaster, there are a few tropes to give up.

First, that the FAA fire safety people know little about fires. They know a lot, and they are very good at what they do. If you are interested in inadvertent fires, you should get to know them.

Second, you need to stop propagating any "advice" which is different from that currently being proposed by airworthiness authorities. Theirs is based on research and testing, whereas yours appears to be based on a superficial knowledge of battery types and technologies, on some of your own self-described limited experience, and on some anonymous internet videos. A little more social responsibility is in order. You need to take on board the advice of people with experience dealing with fire hazards in aviation contexts, for example the FAA fire safety people.

Third, if you don't like the advice given by FAA fire safety people, then look a little further afield, such as the UK report cited here, for example, which was written on the basis of contract research performed by an industrial lab.

Fourth, a little more discriminative subtlety in your hazard analysis (if one may glorify it with such a phrase) would help. Crew using laptops in cockpits are using devices with batteries whose risk of fire is very low indeed. All of the problems with cell phone batteries to date, as well as most of the problems with laptop batteries, except for a batch that came with some Sony machines a few years ago, are with "aftermarket" batteries, many of which do not have the quality control or inbuilt hazard-mitigation structure of the batteries which OEMs install in their devices. There lies a simple mitigation strategy for the hazard of electronic-device fires in cockpits: don't use aftermarket batteries. However, it is difficult to prevent passengers from doing so, which means one needs a different strategy for the cabin. There is one for the airplane in general in most jurisdictions: no laptops or other consumer electronics with large long-life batteries in checked baggage. There is a third: no hazmat cargo on passenger airplanes. All those batteries have to get from where they are built to where they are going, however, and while one imagines most cheaper products are shipped by sea, some of them find their way onto pallets on airplanes, not necessarily classified as hazmat. That, apparently, is where the freight people have what seems to be a major problem. But that is worlds away from portable computers on the flight deck.

Everyone agrees that portable-electronics-battery fires are a problem. It doesn't help solve the problem to suggest that people who have been working hard on that problem for years, with some success, really don't have a clue.

PBL
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