QANTAS, JetStar and Virgin are reportedly set to ban power banks on their aircraft, which is a serious blow to users of cameras and drones as well as other accessory / smartphone users.
It’s always been the case that batteries and power banks needed to be carried on board and not placed in luggage going into the hold, and additionally in the case of drone batteries at least, batteries had to be kept separated and in plastic bags with the terminals taped.
However, a recent series of fires in overhead lockers apparently made the companies decide even that is not enough and so, a total ban may be placed meaning you will have to buy any power banks needed locally upon arrival.
So, what causes these batteries / power banks to suddenly combust?
The most common is due to overcharging and / or leaving them in a charger. During my tenure at JayCar over the COVID period, I saw quite a few of these where people would bring them back trying to claim a warranty, only for us to discover they had kept them in a charger for sometimes days at a time and the batteries had become swollen, and therefore, potentially very dangerous.
Time will also cause them to degrade, especially if there are repeated charging / discharging cycles.
And we cannot overlook cheaper models that don’t have overcharge protection or use low quality risky cells. Buy a brand name in other words, not unbranded or knockoffs.
What makes it worse is that lithium fires are a) very difficult to extinguish and b) cause very toxic fumes, deadly in an enclosed space like an aircraft cabin.
Hopefully, if rules are enforced at check-in and through security to ensure that the proper precautions are taken with carry-on batteries and power banks, this can be better policed and mean the heavy handedness is unnecessary. The alternative of course is making sure seats on all flights have USB charging ports.
I put together a video a while back re: carrying batteries on planes, and what the current rules and regulations are. You can see it below.
Of course, if this changes, I’ll be updating it ASAP.