American Airlines (AA) flight 2405 from San Francisco International Airport (SFO) to Miami International Airport (MIA) had to be evacuated while parked at the gate. According to ABC News, “the airline said the smoke came from a laptop in a passenger’s bag.” RELATED: Can you travel with lithium ion batteries in chargers, phones and tablets?

An American Airlines airplane was evacuated due to smoke coming from a passenger's laptop bag.ABC News interviewed a passenger named Jan Jankai, who was traveling with his father. Jan said that when they boarded the plane, ‘it smelled like burned cables and proceeded to get stronger.” Jankai then said, “they saw a huge flame from below his father’s seat and on all sides. He said “the smoke got so intense we thought we would pass out.”

Jankai continued, “we tried to get up but were already buckled in.” Fortunately, his father quickly unbuckled their seatbelts and tried to go to the back emergency exit. It turns out the bag that was on fire was under his father’s seat and he threw the bag out of the emergency exit door.

According to FlightAware, the A321 (screenshot embedded above) was taken out of service. The flight was supposed to depart SFO at 12:17pm but the replacement aircraft didn’t take off until 12:16am, almost 12 hours later. It arrived safely in MIA at 8:49am.

Below is footage of the plane evacuation. As you can see, it was a scary moment for those in the back and what makes it even worse, is how nonchalant people are when grabbing their bags. Plane wings are full of fuel and passengers could have just seconds to safely evacuate if thing really go south.

 

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San Francisco’s local news posted on Threads: “Although officials haven’t determined what caused smoke to fill the cabin of an American Airlines flight at SFO, SKY7 captured firefighters placing a possible laptop in a tub of water. SFFD tells us that the proper way to put out a lithium-ion battery fire is to place it in water.”

 

Post by @abc7newsbayarea
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There are  some lessons to be learned here:

1. Know how to unbuckle your seatbelt and how to do it quickly
This should be common sense but make sure that you know how to unbuckle your seatbelts and those of your children quickly. I don’t put my seatbelt on until the plane pushes back or until the flight attendant tells me to.

2. Follow crew instructions
This is also common sense but follow crew instructions, as they are trained regularly to know what to do in an emergency. According to OneMileAtATime, the father was told not to open the emergency exit door: “I wasn’t supposed to. She told me not to, but when I boarded the plane, I had this strange feeling, and I already looked at the doors on the wings, and they said ‘armed.’ So my first initial thought when I got up off the seat, I was like the doors have to be armed, so the slides have to be armed, and then I could jump out. I was actually a bit outside the plane and I tried to jump, but the slides wasn’t released, so I did get back into the plane. Yeah, that’s basically the first thought.”

3. Do not put lithium batteries in checked baggage
Not everyone knows this but you must always carry lithium battery-powered devices onto the plane in your carry-on. Lithium batteries cannot be checked and if this laptop had been in the cargo hold, the results could have been disastrous.

4. Give yourself plenty of time
When booking a flight, give yourself plenty of time to get where you’re going because delays and cancelations happen. If you’re going on a cruise, to a wedding or have an important meeting, consider flying in a day (or two or three) early.

5. Pay with a credit card and get travel insurance
Pay for your plane ticket with a credit card that has great travel protection and get travel insurance so you can get reimbursed for delays like this.

KEEP READING

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1 Comment On "American Airlines plane evacuated after smoke fills the cabin in intense incident"
  1. Barbara|

    I carry my passport, money, credit cards, prescriptions in a money belt around my waist and save important travel docs to my cloud ie: train tickets hotel confirmations travel ins. etc. My phone is always in a pocket on my body. Everything else can be easily replaced. Trying to take my luggage with me is to big a risk for me and my fellow passengers. I have gotten to the point where I don’t even feel my money belt any more.

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