HelderBerg (SAA 747 Combi downing in Indian Ocean)
"Helderberg crash IASA Lithium Fire"
Any aviation journalist who googles that will have a wealth of information on the first large aircraft downing due to Lithium Ion battery fires - so many decades ago now. Boeing stopped offering the "cargo in aft section of pax compartment" 747 Combi after that event. The Helderberg event coincided with the bulk carriage of Li Ion watch batteries that happened inreasingly - just as digital watches and pocket calculators were becoming the norm. That bulk carriage of Li ion batts in air-freight is now banned by IATA and the FAA. Not sure why a bunch of aircraft-powering Li Ion accumulators with an even higher power density is (perversely) OK, yet a properly packed container of segregated tiny watch/calculator/phone batteries is not.
However anybody who's seen the results of the Dell laptop battery fires would have no doubt that it's an issue best ducked. Thermal runaway that doesn't need oxygen and cannot be suppressed? Bad enough in an isolated cargo hold, but in an avionics compartment or an inaccessible APU location?
It's not as if you can make them jettisonable. A main load center/avionics compartment in a 787 is a slightly different proposition to most other aircraft that aren't so "electrical" in nature. It's the heart of what makes it fly, not just the aircraft avionics. Aircraft control becomes an issue.
The 787 was designed to be a nil hydraulics electrically powered beastie. .... so battery capacity and reliability was quintessential to safety. I'm wondering what dispensations and extra requirements specifications were finagled by Boeing engineers in the design approval process (via sympathetic FAA weenies). Maybe the new FAA administrator started looking into this after the fires started, discovered something and then had no choice but to order a "review". More power to his elbow.
If the Lithium Ion battery fires continue or there's an unexplained loss due to a crew having to quickly monitor off busses in a fire and smoke drill? That will be a nightmare for both Boeing and the FAA. It's got all the potential of a NASA Challenger disaster and a denial of leaky seals being a threat to the Space Shuttle.
But one thing is for certain. Boeing will not be giving up on those Li Ion batteries in the 787. There's no viable alternative with the required power density. And a timely fixing of a new aircraft that's both in service and on the assembly line? Burn that midnight oil you Boeing engineers. Whatever you come up with as a fix better be good.