Ban laptops in the cabin? Not so quick.
As federal authorities wrestle with whether to extend a ban on laptops in airline cabins and banish them to checked baggage, a huge open question remains.
Would a ban simply trade the risk of a terror attack in the cabin for the risk of a spontaneous fire or explosion in the cargo hold, caused by sometimes volatile lithium-ion batteries?
Federal Aviation Administration research on these batteries has focused on shipments in cargo of batteries alone — not those in devices. But having that answer is critical as the Department of Homeland Security considers expanding a laptop ban imposed in March at 10 Middle East and North Africa airports with direct flights to the United States.
The government cited intelligence showing that terrorists had developed ways to place thin sheets of explosives in laptops that could not be detected by checkpoint X-ray screening or by requiring fliers to turn on their machines. At many airports, screening of checked bags is more sensitive and more likely to detect such explosives.
Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly told a House panel last week that he’s considering extending the ban to 71 more foreign airports, adding that some could avoid a ban if they adopted new security procedures. Any decision on extending the ban — po- tentially to airports in Europe with direct U.S. flights — must be weighed against the danger of adding perhaps hundreds of bags holding lithium-ion batteries to the cargo bay. Research and recent history raise troubling questions:
Though battery fires are extremely rare given tens of millions of flights a year, the FAA recorded 33 incidents last year where lithium-ion batteries in personal devices caused fires in cabins.
Concerns about fires have generally focused on large-scale shipments of batteries themselves, which have been implicated in two cargo plane crashes. The FAA also found that halon gas used to suppress cargo fires does not work on certain battery fires
No data are publicly available about government tests of batteries in laptops packed in luggage. Few travelers stow laptops in checked bags now because they want to use them during flights, or fear theft or loss.
Security officials must heed the latest intelligence. But each time the Transportation Security Administration creates a new ban or procedure — from shoe removals, to banning liquids of more than 3.4 ounces, to intrusive patdowns looking for underwear bombs — travelers are more inconvenienced and terrorists find a new route of attack. “Temporary” bans have a way of becoming permanent.
Several large companies have developed new CT-scan technology that they say can detect thin sheets of explosives in laptops at checkpoints. It still must be tested and run the bureaucratic gauntlet of federal procurement, and Congress must be willing to come up with the purchase money, perhaps in excess of $1 billion. But this is a better way to go.
Most important, officials must not extend a laptop ban until they can assure the American public — with sound data — that they are not trading the possibility of terrorism in the cabin for a greater likelihood of catastrophe in the cargo bay.