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British Airways Airbus A321neo operating flight 585 out of Milan Malpensa Airport (MXP) narrowly avoided a fiery mishap when a baggage container caught fire just before it was loaded on the tarmac. A video shared by Jon Sopel on X showed fire engines and emergency crew rushing to the scene as smoke billowed from the rapidly growing fire.
The source of the fire remains under investigation, but the initial speculation is that lithium-ion batteries from consumer electronics inside passenger luggage likely sparked the inferno, as Corriere Della Sera reported. Despite the dramatic disruption, BA585 finally arrived in London Heathrow (LHR) after a delay of just under two hours, according to FlightAware.
A Near-Miss On The Apron In Milan
A fire on the ramp is no small matter but far less grave than a blaze erupting in the belly hold of a jetliner in flight. The combustibility of lithium-based batteries is hazardous because they are difficult to extinguish, but the real danger to air travel is the high concentration of batteries in baggage. As Corriere Della Sera noted, each individual traveler now carries five Li-ion powered devices on average.
On Sunday, ground crews managed to evacuate nearby baggage containers, and airport firefighters extinguished the blaze within minutes. If the fire started in the air, events could have unfolded with a very different outcome. Cargo hold fire suppression systems are designed to suppress and slow down conventional fires by starving them of oxygen. Aircraft are not able to easily extinguish a chemical thermal runaway.
Had a Li-ion battery ignited inside a tightly packed cargo hold at 35,000 feet, detecting the fire would be delayed and then combating the self-sustaining fire becomes a race against time. The sole effective solution to save the aircraft is an immediate emergency landing at the nearest suitable airport. In that scenario, the pilots often have less than 19 minutes to land before the fire spirals into an unrecoverable disaster, according to UL Standards.
The Incendiary Issue With Check Bags
Lithium-based power cells have become a hot topic related to the safety of flight across both the passenger and cargo transport sectors of commercial aviation. Li-ion batteries are present in many devices from cellphones to laptops, backup batteries, or cameras and many other portable electronics. The rapid increase in power density and steadily increasing sales of power bank devices for consumers over the past several years has made the issue more acute.
The deadly seriousness of the danger posed by Li-ion devices was made apparent in 2010 after the crash of UPS Airlines flight 6. On September 3, the Boeing 747-400 freighter departed Dubai carrying a massive cargo shipment that included hundreds of undeclared lithium batteries. According to the investigation by the Federal Aviation Administration, a battery entered thermal runaway less than an hour into the flight.
The Li-ion cell auto-ignited and rapidly spread to the other electronics in the hold. Within three minutes of the first alarm, toxic smoke completely blinded the pilots and overwhelmed the cockpit. The intense heat burned through flight control cables and melted the crew’s emergency oxygen supply systems.
UPS flight 6 crashed near Dubai, killing both crew members. Less than a year later, Asiana Airlines Flight 991 experienced a similar crisis. Despite attempting an emergency diversion, the crew lost total control, crashed into the sea, and perished on impact.
Abundant Caution: Standard Operating Procedure
It is theoretically possible for overland itineraries to permit an emergency diversion in time for an airliner to land before a Li-ion battery fire consumes the aircraft. In the case of long-haul flying over expanses of open ocean, that is no longer possible. So while the industry has instituted strict safety protocols to ensure that Li-ion power cells are controlled, international flights often take that abundance of precaution a step further.
This was particularly spotlighted by the case of United Airlines flight 126 last October. The jet had taken off from Washington Dulles International (IAD) bound for Rome Airport (FCO) when a passenger somehow managed to drop a laptop through a gap in the sidewall and into the cargo hold. To many observers, this seemed like an extreme reaction. However, as the fatal mishaps have shown in the past, it was the correct decision in the interest of safety of flight.
The pilots of UA126 reported to air traffic control that they had completely lost any situational awareness on the Li-ion device, according to Business Insider. This would have made it impossible to know if it began to burn and prevented firefighting measures from being effective. As a result, the Boeing 767 made a U-turn about 50 miles off the coast of Massachusetts and returned to base. Sunday’s fire at MXP reinforces the continued danger of Li-ion, emphasizing the importance of compliance with safety regulations for batteries in the cabin.
