While taking commercial flights tends to typically be a fairly straightforward affair, there are always times when things don’t go quite as planned.
Airlines do the most they can to be prepared for flights to proceed safely to their destinations. However, a range of things can happen that can leave you grounded, wondering if the plane will ever take off.
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While its annoying to have to wait after boarding the plane, double checking for any possible safety issue is necessary to ensure travelers’ safety.
Then there are the unavoidable but frightening wild cards, like bomb threats, which typically make pilots land the plane as soon as they can to address the safety issue. As scary as they are, they do happen from time to time — and hopefully never on a flight you’re on.
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A recent incident on a Delta (DAL)  flight bound for Fort Lauderdale forced an early landing, and it may set an example for the airline that a policy change may need to be enforced.
Travelers recently were forced to divert to Florida on a Delta flight.
Image source: Brandon Bell/Getty Images
A fire breaks out on Delta plane
Delta flight 1334, which was originally set to travel from Atlanta to Fort Lauderdale, was forced to make an emergency landing on July 7 after a fire broke out on the plane.
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According to a statement from Delta, a battery in a passenger’s personal device exploded into flames mid-flight. Flight attendants were able to extinguish the fire, but diverted the flight to Fort Myers due to lingering smoke.
The plane made a safe landing just after 8:30 a.m. at Southwest Florida International Airport in Fort Myers, per Flightaware.com.Â
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The pilot said over the radio, “OK, so the uh, the backpack has been contained. We think it was a lithium, uhh, battery that uh, caused the smoke and the fire. It’s in a containment bag. Uh, no smoke in the cabin at this point,” in audio from liveatc.ne, per a report from Gulf Coast News Now.
“We appreciate the quick work and actions by our people to follow their training, and we apologize to our customers for the delay in their travels,” a Delta spokesperson said in a statement.
No passengers were harmed in the incident, and the flight was cleared to take them on to Fort Lauderdale in the early afternoon.
The risks of lithium batteries on aircraft
This incident comes at a time when many airlines are changing their policies on lithium batteries, which are used in common devices such as laptops, tablets, portable chargers, and smartphones.
The reason for the changes is an uptick in incidents regarding fires and the batteries. After a fire destroyed an Air Busan plane in South Korea in January, investigators believed a power bank fire may have been the source.
After that, the South Korean government advised that travelers keep portable chargers in reach and out of the overhead bins. Thai Airways, Singapore Airlines, and Malaysia Airlines have also banned the use of power banks during flights.
Southwest announced in May that it would also change its rules around power banks, announcing that passengers cannot use them to charge other devices that are stowed in the overhead compartment. It may be time for Delta to do the same.