“Another Dell laptop has undergone spontaneous combustion, prompting the evacuation of the office it was situated in and the urgent intervention of the local fire brigade. Pictures of the incident point to a battery meltdown as the cause of the conflagration,” Tony Smith reports for The Register.
Full article with photo here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “James” for the heads up.]
More photos and info here.
Related MacDailyNews articles:
Dell laptop fires may have been downplayed – July 22, 2006
Temperature Test: Apple MacBook vs. Dell Latitude D620 – July 18, 2006
NY Times: Dell’s exploding laptop and other image problems – July 10, 2006
Dell laptop explodes into flames at Japanese conference – June 21, 2006
Why buy a Dell when Apple’s Intel-based computers will run both Mac OS X and Windows? – June 08, 2005
odds: It’s only a matter of time before a Dell ignites on an airplane.
Guess what? It may have already happened:
http://www.tgdaily.com/2006/07/13/ntsb_laptopbattery_upsfire/
“FAA official William Wilkening testified that there have been 60 incidents since 1991 that involved batteries catching on fire, smoking or getting hot. According to Wilkening, most of the batteries were lithium or lithium-ion. He added that in the past ten years the FAA has given 49 fines totaling $517,000 for improper packaging of lithium batteries. Harry Webster with the FAA Technical Center testified that lithium-ion batteries could vent flammable liquid and “pose a risk to the cargo compartment.””
It’s too bad you can’t see any of the photos. (except one) “Bandwidth Exceeded”
Wow another one bites the dust. Isnt the same thing happening to ipod nanos?