A mobile battery in charge ignited during an Air France flight, setting in motion the cabin crew to contain what could have degenerated into a much more serious fire than in the end.
There are phrases you never want to hear on a plane in flight. And we’re not talking about “Damn, I forgot the keys on the apartment door” (even if it’s very embarrassing). Marie-Cécile Zinsou, president of the Zinsou Foundation for Contemporary Art in Ouidah, Benin, is in Business class in theAir France A330 linking Paris-Charles de Gaulle to Accra, the capital of Ghana. Suddenly, she hears: “It’s smoking, it’s going to explode!”. She immediately looks out the window and thinks that if the plane is on fireit’s way too high for them to have a chance of getting out of it.
Fortunately, the smoke does not come from the airbus, but from the smartphone battery of his neighbour. The phone is charging and its owner quickly realized what was happening. One of the flight attendants remembers: “About three hours after takeoff, I smelled the smell of burning electronic components. After checking my gear, I get up and start looking around.”
A mobile battery ignites in an aircraft, the crew reacts instantly and extinguishes the fire
From there, everything goes very quickly. The purser retrieves the phone. His colleagues follow him at the level of the intercabine, which is less exposed. All wore smoke hoods silver. In a few seconds, the mobile is placed on the ground and 2 or 3 fire extinguishers are emptied on it. Flight attendants go back and forth with champagne buckets filled with water (remember this is in business class).
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The worst was finally avoided thanks to the responsiveness of the crew, “formed and trained regularly for this type of situation” recalls Air France. The company also specifies that “flight safety has never been questioned”. The plane also landed without delay in Ghana. Behind the curtain that separates Business class from the rest of the aircraft, no one suspected anything. We do not know why the mobile battery caught fire. A few years ago, an external battery ignited in an A320, again for no apparent reason.
Source: Le Figaro