Laptops May Be Banned From Checked Baggage On Planes

The United States Federal Aviation Administration has proposed a worldwide ban on laptops in checked baggage on all international flights.

The issue has to due with a recent FAA report about lithium-ion batteries catching fire.

The fear that terrorists could try to hide explosives in laptops prompted the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to ban laptops from the cabin of planes coming from certain international airports earlier this year, that  prompted more people to check the laptops in their bags.

At that time some argued the rule posed its own safety problems due the risk of fires from those laptops

If a laptop were to catch fire in the checked luggage area of an aircraft, there would be no way to contain the flames.

The FAA conducted 10 tests, and in one, in which an aerosol can was packed alongside a laptop, the computer burst into flames almost immediately.

The ban will be considered by the International Civil Aviation Organization, a United Nations organization, at it’s meeting this month.

Even if the organization endorses the proposal from its Dangerous Goods Panel, which is making the recommendation, it would be up to regulators in individual nations to pass rules to enforce it.