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US Bans Electronic Cigarettes From Checked Baggage Over Fire Risks (foxnews.com) 131

An anonymous reader writes: Earlier this month, the FDA announced it would regulate electronic cigarettes and other new tobacco products. Now, the U.S. Transportation Department announced it is permanently banning passengers and crew members from carrying electronic cigarettes in checked baggage or charging the devices onboard aircraft. They have cited a number of recent incidents that show the devices can catch fire during flight. Passengers can still carry e-cigarettes in their carry-on baggage or on their person, they just can't use the devices on flights. "Fire hazards in flight are particularly dangerous," Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx said in a statement. "Banning e-cigarettes from checked bags is a prudent and important safety measure." The new rule covers e-cigarettes, e-cigars, e-pipes, and battery-powered portable electronic smoking devices in general. It does not prohibit passengers from transporting other battery-powered devices for personal use like laptop computers or cellphones.
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US Bans Electronic Cigarettes From Checked Baggage Over Fire Risks

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  • n/t
    • by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 19, 2016 @09:14PM (#52146339)

      The truth is, yes, this type of thing can happen, but it is easily preventable by being careful about marrying your batteries and not using a low resistance coil at high wattages (to prevent drawing too many amps from being pulled from the battery). There are simple calculators you can use online if you can't be assed with learning Ohm's Law, too. No excuse for stupidity.

      Also, stay away from so-called mechanical mods unless you know what you're doing (in mech mods, the activation button physically completes the circuit between the battery and the coil instead of using a circuit board to control it all).

      • by OzPeter ( 195038 ) on Thursday May 19, 2016 @09:20PM (#52146361)

        No excuse for stupidity.

        If the TSA could screen for stupidity, then there wouldn't be a TSA in the first place.

        Unfortunately for the rest of us there is no test to keep stupid people from flying.

        • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

          by Ossifer ( 703813 )

          If the TSA could screen for stupidity, then there wouldn't be...

          ... anyone to bring these devices onto the plane.

        • If the TSA could screen for stupidity, then there wouldn't be a TSA in the first place.

          If there were no stupid people, there would be no market for vapers.

      • Learn2BuckBoost stupid vapers
    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Cheap batteries explode when charged improperly, news at 11.

    • Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)

      by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Friday May 20, 2016 @01:54AM (#52147029)
      Comment removed based on user account deletion
      • hell I've even seen video of a future Darwin award winner that has a fucking 110v POWER STRIP floating on a donut in a pool

        Interestingly enough this is the one thing on your list that would be very unlikely to kill you. If it's attached to a ground fault interrupter it would almost be outright impossible to kill.

        • IF the socket it's plugged into has a GFI, many homes still don't have those at all, or only have them in the bathrooms and kitchen. And then there are the capacitors in the TV itself.

          PP is correct in calling that a Darwin candidate.
          • by thegarbz ( 1787294 ) on Friday May 20, 2016 @11:33AM (#52149663)

            No he's not. Electricity takes the path of least resistance through a body. If the power plug fell into the pool the people likely wouldn't notice. In order to get electrocuted the people themselves would need to be between the active source of electricity and the return path it is taking, and the probes would need to be close enough together such that the resistance of the water causes an insignificant enough voltage drop compared to the resistance of the human body.

            In something the size of a swimming pool if the current return path is through some metal part of the closest edge of the pool then the cross section of the human body is likely insignificant and may experience a small tingling sensation. If the current return path is through the outlet itself then it would almost impossible to get your body in a position where it can kill you. Even if you did try to get yourself into that position you'll be in pain before you get close enough to dying (there's pools in Japan that offer this sensation via two electric plates that get closer together. The further up the pool you swim the stronger the electrical sensation).

            But the best part is this is not a case where you have to take my word for it. Go throw an extension cord into the pool sans GFI, get out your multimeter and put the probes a set distance apart and start measuring the voltage drop. You'll find it almost impossible to measure a voltage drop anywhere short of almost sitcking your probes right into the power outlet.

            Or if you don't feel like doing this experiment just jump on Youtube where plenty of people have done it, and then even put their body parts in between the leads, and then even repeated it with salt water.

            Yes stupid unlikely things happen, but this is still very unlikely to kill you.

            • Comment removed based on user account deletion
              • Yeah. Still won't matter. Those capacitors have really high voltages but the path of electricity is again very tight. Electricity is about as slack and motivated as Homer Simpson with a beer, it's not going to go out of its way to find someone and kill them, it'll take the path of least resistance (or the path of least inductance for transient pulses). For a capacitive discharge that is the distance between two plates. For someone to get electrocuted by the HV circuit they'd need to simultaneously have a fa

        • hell I've even seen video of a future Darwin award winner that has a fucking 110v POWER STRIP floating on a donut in a pool

          Interestingly enough this is the one thing on your list that would be very unlikely to kill you. If it's attached to a ground fault interrupter it would almost be outright impossible to kill.

          As well, the volume of water will make it very unlikely that anyone could get a fatal shock. Still a stupid trick.

      • For those that do not know a "mech mod" is a very specialized piece of kit really only used by a handful that consider themselves "pro vapors"

        And considered by everyone else to be massive hipster douchebags?

      • Thanks for the explanation. There's one thing I don't get though: why would anyone want to use an (apparently unreliable) mechanical mod in the first place? I'm assuming there's some sort of benefit, perceived or real, that makes users seek them out?

        • With a mec mod there are no buit-in protections, so no restrictions. The only "rule" is Ohm Law. That means you can build a ridiculous low coil setup, in the low sub-ohm range, and get the most watts out of the battery.
          Of course, that also means that if you fuck up your build, there are no built-in protections to save you if your battery goes into bad territory.

          That being said... with the ample selection of regulated devices that support high wattage output, up to 200W in some cases... it's mainly a questio

        • There's one thing I don't get though: why would anyone want to use an (apparently unreliable) mechanical mod in the first place?

          Just a guess, but I'm assuming it is perceived as letting you get more nicotine faster....

        • by swb ( 14022 )

          The e-cig world is no different than any other niche interest area.

          There are always people with a knack for tinkering who want something better than the other guy, vendors willing to take their money, and people with more money than knowledge wanting to appear to be elite, and an entire online community to foment such a mindset.

          I've seen it over and over. Computers. Gaming. Boats. Guns. Woodworking. Cars.

          IMHO, the reality is there are dozens of simple, safe basic vaporizing setups that use cheap dispo

        • Either they're going for a bigger hit, or they're smoking something other than juice and they want more power. I believe the current euphemism for solids is "flour".

        • Comment removed based on user account deletion
      • If a moron built his own 22 pistol and it blew up in his face....would you blame firearms?

        Because that is EXACTLY what this fucknuts did, he bought a VERY expensive and VERY specialized MECHANICAL MOD. For those that do not know a "mech mod" is a very specialized piece of kit really only used by a handful that consider themselves "pro vapors" as it has NO protection or overload circuits, its just a battery and a trigger. this means you HAVE TO know Ohms law like the back of your hand, know the battery output down to the .0 wattage, I know guys that have been vaping a decade that won't touch mech mods because of how much time you have to invest in them to keep them from being seriously dangerous....can we ALL guess where this is going?

        If you said "rich dipshit with more money than brains and who doesn't know Ohm's law from a seatbelt law buys a $300+ mech mod, throws a $20 gas station top on it and blows his dumbass up"? Then you win a cookie. I mean for fuck's sake guys, we've seen morons take a glock and promptly shoot themselves in the foot, hell I've even seen video of a future Darwin award winner that has a fucking 110v POWER STRIP floating on a donut in a pool to power a portable TV...do we blame these objects for the fucking idiots that don't know how to use them properly?

        If you buy a normal vaping device, not some crazy mech mod or $5 Chinese special? Then you have absolutely ZERO to worry about as they all have overload and short circuit protection, hell I'm looking at a 40 watter right now I have to take to the local vape shop to get a seal replaced on because the rubber grommet got a teeny tiny bit worn down with all the tanks I've swapped on the thing and just that little bit of wear was enough for the unit to shut down with a "short circuit protection" error code. this is why I have ZERO worries about any of my units blowing up in my face, no matter what tank i throw on it as even the $30 basic box mods have automatic adjustment for ohms and will not allow the unit to fire if you put a top on that is too high or too low ohms for it to fire safely.

        What we have in the article you cited is no different than a rich dipshit that buys a Kawasaki Ninja was his first bike and promptly fucks himself up or kills himself, he bought the vaping equivalent of a dragster without even knowing where the gas goes in the fucking thing.

        I've dissasssmbled 10 different models or so and they ranged from no safety (on regular cheap ass models) to leaky over voltage and under voltage protection. None had over current protection which is what you would need to prevent a fire by shorting the terminals. The real problem is China garbage with no safety to shave off 50 cents on each model. It is not limited to a single brand or mod.

  • terminals/parking lots/shuttles/etc....
  • People are capable of Spontaneous Human Combustion without a source of fire too. I guess we should ban them too. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
    • by rtb61 ( 674572 )

      I seriously think you really do not get the concept of being a human being, a social species for whom empathy is a requirement for social cohesion. If just one blows up in some ones face it is a serious problem, eyes, ears, taste, appearance, let alone repeated examples. The manufacturer of a defective device in this context considering the nature of the harm, deserves a custodial sentences, anyone profiting by blowing up someone face, deserve a custodial sentence, regardless of context. If a particular gu

    • by Anonymous Coward
      even your linked source casts significant doubt as to SHC ever having occurred and that the likely scenario is ignition sources that are conveniently left out of most accounts (like smoking, next to a fireplace, candles etc etc).
      • Not to mention all the oddities of "SHC" like melted bones can be explained quite satisfactorily by the wick effect, as experiments have repeatedly proven. When there IS a perfectly viable scientific explanation for the evidence you found, then claims of an unexplained phenomenon become extremely suspect. And the evidence mostly consists of bodies found in states of burning that suggest far higher heat than normal. Nothing to suggest it was spontaneous or extraordinary... all you need is to be wearing tight

    • This has been modded "Flamebait." Oddly appropriate.

    • Only from checked baggage. You are still free to pack people in your carry-on luggage or carry them on your person.
  • Those also are flammable and cause explosions. Just glad cell phones don't explode or catch fire....o snap.
  • by Anonymous Coward

    Okay, so thing that can explode/cause a fire is banned from checked baggage, yet the same thing that can explode/cause a fire is allowed in carry-on luggage?!? Seriously, what the fuck? Oh, well, we can't have fires in the cargo space, but inside the cabin? Perfectly fine. Thanks USA, for the usual amount of sense in protecting your citizens.

    • by Anonymous Coward

      Actually it does make sense, there are staff able to quickly deal with the issue rather than a fire growing in the cargo hold.

    • by irving47 ( 73147 )

      This IS a tricky one. Maybe they think that a fire will be more easily extinguished if one gets shorted out during flight. I am thinking their reasoning is based on shifting luggage, which could cause the older models to mechanically engage and just keep heating up. Whereas the ones on carry-ons might be dealt with sooner?

      The only argument I can come up with against the new rule is, "surely the TSA and the baggage handlers are treating each bag as if it were their own and with the utmost care...."

      • by DarkOx ( 621550 )

        A small fire in the cabin is something that will almost certainly be smelt or spotted in time for someone to beat it out with a coat, towel, or hit with a fire extinguisher long before its likely able to threaten the plane. A fire in tightly packed cargo hold on the other hand will likely be quite a lot larger before a smoke detector is triggered and very much more difficult to get near enough to do anything about. It very well could threaten the plane. There may be enough air trapped in the luggage to p

    • by goose-incarnated ( 1145029 ) on Friday May 20, 2016 @12:48AM (#52146861) Journal

      Okay, so thing that can explode/cause a fire is banned from checked baggage, yet the same thing that can explode/cause a fire is allowed in carry-on luggage?!? Seriously, what the fuck? Oh, well, we can't have fires in the cargo space, but inside the cabin? Perfectly fine. Thanks USA, for the usual amount of sense in protecting your citizens.

      Ever heard of the Helderberg [wikipedia.org]? Cargo fires grow unnoticed until they consume the plane. Cabin fires are quickly spotted.

      • by chihowa ( 366380 )

        Cargo fires grow unnoticed until they consume the plane.

        That seems like a big problem that we already have the technology to address. Have there been efforts to increase the density of smoke alarms in the cargo hold or even add alternative methods of fire detection since then? Even a net of temperature sensors distributed throughout the hold would allow the detection of smoldering fires before they consumed the plane!

  • by Trachman ( 3499895 ) on Thursday May 19, 2016 @10:26PM (#52146515) Journal

    Every time I go through the airport in a secured zone, I see shelves stacked with wine, whiskey, beer, vodka, champagne. Every bottle, when broken, is a potential ceramic knife. By the way, a very sharp knife.

    Two quarters of 100 proof spirit is very flammable. Whiskey in the bottle is just an expensive Molotov cocktail - lite.

    • by Dan667 ( 564390 )
      the tsa is not about "being safer" it is to "feeling safer" and a way for well connected people to bilk taxpayers with expensive scanning machines. the tsa should just be shut down and removed from airports, security would not change.
    • I don't think they serve or let you carry booze over 80 proof on planes.

      80 proof booze won't burn unless heated first. Then only the vapor burns.

    • by DarkOx ( 621550 )

      http://www.terminalcornucopia.... [terminalcornucopia.com]

    • by Threni ( 635302 )

      Not sure where you're seeing beer bottles made of ceramic, whatver. I'm not concerned with that, or even sharp glass. Someone's got a knife; someone else will take it off them. I'm probably safe. A fire/explosion in the cargo hold; that's bad news for everyone. This restriction makes sense. If you need to smoke then sort it out when you land, or don't travel.

      • right... glass is ceramic. If you are not concerned with the knifes, then why are they are stealing nail scissors in the airports. Because of people like you people wait in the lines for multiple hours.

        Fire in the cargo hold is a royal fuckup, especially if the fire is in the middle of the ocean. That being said, electronic pipe in the passenger compartment is probably the safest thing that you can have.

        Now comes the checked baggage. E-cigarette has a battery, most of the time it is Li-ion battery. That be

  • by Anonymous Coward

    Oh come off it, i just recently got off a flight from LA to SYD where another passenger from the same flight had his bag catch fire on the train from the airport. Turns out he had power drills and their batteries in there. How are you going to stop an e-cigarette when people are taking power drills and batteries aboard in checked baggage?

    Next we will be leaving laptops, tablets, watches and phones at home too.....

  • by eWarz ( 610883 ) on Friday May 20, 2016 @12:22AM (#52146789)
    Just an FYI, Philadelphia was enforcing this when i flew out of there a few weeks ago to come home. They asked me specifically about those items prior to letting me check my bags in. Nashville (my hometown) had not started this procedure yet.
  • by mark-t ( 151149 ) <{moc.talfdren} {ta} {tkram}> on Friday May 20, 2016 @12:27AM (#52146801) Journal

    The story talks about an ecig exploding during *USE*, not while it was unattended... or in luggage on a plane.

    Using it on a plane is a non-issue, since I can't remember the last time I was on a plane that allowed smoking at all during the flight.

    And in matters of storage, why are batteries for ecigs more dangerous than any other kind of battery?

    • by Anonymous Coward

      Because, big tobacco needs to ensure the recently announced enforcement doesn't wander into logical regulations. Don't think, feel afraid and glad you are being protected from such dangerous things. Have a Marlboro and stay away from danger.

      • Actually I think you will find that big tobacco does have a hand in this through lobbying. The problem that big tobacco has is that a vaping habit only costs five dollars a month instead of the $100 that they are used to from tobacco smokers. Any regulation of cheap stuff from China is to their advantage, so some home brew short circuited battery explosion is the best news they have had for ages. Banning them from checked luggage is just one step on the road to getting China out of the market and replaced w

        • Actually I think you will find that big tobacco does have a hand in this through lobbying. The problem that big tobacco has is that a vaping habit only costs five dollars a month instead of the $100 that they are used to from tobacco smokers. Any regulation of cheap stuff from China is to their advantage, so some home brew short circuited battery explosion is the best news they have had for ages. Banning them from checked luggage is just one step on the road to getting China out of the market and replaced with their own brand approved systems at joke prices. This is about making money out of the dumb-fuck customers just like all modern business is supposed to do.

          Pretty much this.

          Government and the tobacco industry are co-conspirators in keeping the public smoking tobacco. Like any drug dealer, the government and the tobacco companies are moving to crush anything that might threaten their income and reduce the numbers of people hooked on their poison. There's also a lot of money in the treatment and hospice care industries from smoking-related lung cancer and COPD patients that vaping/e-cigs threaten to reduce.

          If those in government really gave a crap whether or not

          • by DarkOx ( 621550 )

            Don't be ridiculous. There isn't a conspiracy to hook people on smoking by the government. The tobacco settlements are over dear old Uncle Sam has wrung just about as much money out of them as was possible.

            Alcohol is actually the new poising. Consumption of that took a big hit after prohibition and did not recover until the mid sixties but has been steadily growing sense. Alcohol will be the next big public health crisis just like it is/was in post soviet Russia. I do think the government wants it that

            • The tobacco settlements are over dear old Uncle Sam has wrung just about as much money out of them as was possible.

              The government counts on State and Federal tobacco taxes. Then there is the government bureaucracy, infrastructure, and obligatory and attendant bureaucrat fiefdom/budget-protection as a result of tobacco regulation and taxation and the mechanisms/personnel required to implement it, make it function, and maintain it all. Nobody wants to lose power/control and especially the government doesn't want less revenue.

              Arguing that government should encourage vaping is silly. Find me one medical professional that will say using the common vaping products is good for you.

              Strawman argument. I never said vaping was good for you. I said that government should encourage v

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by Solandri ( 704621 )
      Li-ion and LiMn batteries are already banned from the cargo hold of passenger planes. This seems more to be a case of people not knowing ecigs contained a lithium battery, and blithely packing them in their check-in baggage.

      Lithium batteries can suffer a runaway thermal failure when they're punctured or shorted, which can then lead to an explosion and/or fire. While this is more common during use, it can happen while stored if the casing is already damaged and something (like turbulence or something fa
      • by Anonymous Coward

        batteries as cargo is banned i.e. you can't move a pallet of batteries on a passenger flight, but personal items that contain batteries like laptops are not banned

      • I can understand what you're saying (but the other commenter already corrected you about the specifics on that ban), but ... what most people are not aware is that these batteries (normally 18650 bats) are EXACTLY the ones that are used in laptop batteries. If you break open a battery pack from a laptop, all that you'll see inside is a row of 18650 bats ;)

        • Actually, most vapes and e-cigs are too small to accommodate 18650s, and they contain even smaller cells. The one that blew up in this kid's mouth might have had cells that big, though.

      • Typically lithium batteries will pass a puncture with no fire safety test. It's much less likely to happen than in the movies, in fact in many cases rather unlikely. But anytime you have a reasonably high power battery and short the terminals you can create a fire through resistive heating.
    • by Anonymous Coward

      Using it on a plane is a non-issue, since I can't remember the last time I was on a plane that allowed smoking at all during the flight.

      Two things:
      * I see a lot of people allowing themselves to vape in areas where smoking is forbidden (e.g. a train), assuming that.. well, technically vaping is not "smoking", and "it's not dangerous", etc., so it should be allowed, therefore they may vape if they wish to, and "deal with it old man".
      * I've recently been on a plane (Lufthansa flight) where a dozen passengers played the "I dare you to smoke a cigarette without being spotted by the attendant". Not very funny when you don't like the smell of toba

      • by Anonymous Coward

        Thing 1 happens because it's true.
        Thing 2 makes you look like a crybaby.
        I swear you act like someone put a gas mask on you and pumped smoke into it. "Eww I don't like the smell!" Then jump off the plane pussy.

    • The answer is most esigs have no to little safety electronics to shave off the last 50 cents in production. Laptops on the other hand have smart protection circuits with multiple redundancy so there really is no comparison.
      • That's firstly a load of crap, secondly not backed up by the plenty of evidence of batteries bursting into flames spectacularly, and thirdly quite irrelevant since laptop batteries are just as banned in the cargo hold as ecigs.

    • The story talks about an ecig exploding during *USE*, not while it was unattended... or in luggage on a plane.

      the story was about a modded vape that could trivially trigger in baggage due to settling, and something pressing its button... not like normal vapes that you have to press the power button five times (or whatever) in quick succession to turn on. And if you did turn one of those on, it wouldn't blow itself up.

  • How about the baggage compartment is actually sealed and inert during the flight.

  • In my country, vaping is regarded as smoking, and is not allowed on planes, trains, buses or inside any other public space. It's still second hand smoke containing nicotine. Isn't it so in the US?
    • by armanox ( 826486 )

      As of right now, no it's not. Give it a couple more years and it likely will be, since regulations are popping up.

    • Not all of it contains nicotine. And of course, nicotine is one of the LEAST dangerous substances in tobacco smoke.
  • I've dissasssmbled around 10 different brands and examined the electronics just for fun. I've designed smart battery systems for actual products in the field and was curious what types of protection were used. Tl:dr they shaved about half a dollar off each one by providing almost no safety at all.

    Decent single battery systems have over voltage, under voltage, current limiting during charge and discharge, and temperature sensing with bonus points for more advanced features like fuel gaging so that you
  • by silentcoder ( 1241496 ) on Friday May 20, 2016 @08:16AM (#52148139)

    that e-cig batteries are more likely to catch fire than any other rechargeable electronic device ?

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