Quoting Pax Britanica
I assume you cannot ship them because of the potentail risk involved?
So how can it be say to fly around an aircraft with two highly rated LI units bolted to the airframe, I assume I am missing something here.
Commercial airliners are equipped with all kinds of dangerous goods, off the top of my head
-flammable liquids- a B744 can carry almost 170 metric tons of fuel. Try calling Fedex and telling them you want to ship 1 bottle of kerosene!
-Oxygen generators - see Valuair
-Compressed Air - Compressed gases are considered as dangerous goods, things like emergency slides, oxygen bottles and even fire extinguishers.
-Deleted uranium - used as weights (I believe 747 uses them in the stabilizers) and while safe to handle I would imagine shipping them will require them to be classed as dangerous goods.
It is possible to get exemption for extremely dangerous items to be carried.
There was a flight in the early 90s transporting a radioactive shipment from Frankfurt to the US. I was supposed to be the loadmaster on board but the permit issued only allowed 'person neccssary for the operation of the flight' so I got bumped off. The item was about the size of a largish oil-drum and weighted about 3 tons. This was a single use charter so only this item was loaded on the 747. Might not work for 787 batteries on aregular basis tho
This was an exceptional case, however lower grades of radioactive material can even be carried on passenger aircraft, here the loading height has to be observed (to have safe distance from the parcel to the roof (which is the floor of the passenger cabin).
On the freighter aircraft I worked on, there would be an Emergency Response Guide on board which gives info on how to handle different types on incidents with DGR.