Southwest Is About to Restrict Energy Banks on Flights

Southwest Airways will quickly begin capping what number of transportable chargers and energy banks you possibly can carry on a flight, based on an inside message obtained by the New York Times.

In line with the report, beginning April twentieth, passengers will solely be capable of carry one lithium battery-powered transportable charger per particular person to a flight, and so they received’t be allowed to cost these transportable chargers utilizing in-seat energy, nor will they be capable of retailer them within the overhead bins. As an alternative, passengers shall be requested to carry their transportable chargers all through the flight or retailer them in a carry-on bag underneath their seats.

Lithium batteries energy a lot of the expertise we use in our day-to-day lives, from telephones to laptops to e-cigarettes. They’re additionally present in transportable chargers and energy banks.

More often than not, they work high quality, but when they’re broken, overcharged, or overheated, then the batteries can catch hearth. As a result of chemical compounds inside these batteries, the flames they’ll create could possibly be very tough to extinguish.

Resulting from this threat, transportable chargers had been lengthy banned from checked baggage, with airways requiring passengers to place transportable chargers and some other lithium battery-powered gadgets inside their carry-on luggage as a substitute.

However nonetheless, there have been 97 lithium battery-related incidents in aviation in 2025, and there have already been 14 accidents this 12 months, based on the Federal Aviation Administration. Nearly all of the lithium battery-related air incidents that concerned smoke, hearth or excessive warmth stemmed from transportable chargers. The second largest wrongdoer was e-cigarettes, based on the FAA information.

Essentially the most high-profile current incident was in January 2025, when an Airbus aircraft went up in flames on the tarmac at an airport in Busan, South Korea. Everybody on board needed to evacuate, and the fireplace took roughly an hour to extinguish. Authorities later concluded that a power bank saved in an overhead bin might have been the wrongdoer. A couple of months later, an Air China flight needed to make an emergency touchdown when a lithium battery in an overhead bin spontaneously combusted mid-flight.

Chinese language regulators have banned transportable batteries from flights altogether, besides if the gadget is clearly marked with a Chinese language security certification and has not been topic to recollects. Many airways internationally have additionally since banned passengers from utilizing or charging transportable chargers, however Southwest is up to now the one main American airline to come back out with an excellent stricter algorithm for transportable chargers.

A method you could defend your self towards these spontaneous fires is to maintain an in depth eye on product recollects. Anker, one of many world’s main energy financial institution makers, has issued a number of recollects over the previous 12 months as a result of potential hearth dangers.