Moments of panic this morning just before 9 atIpsar Amerigo Vespucci of Milan, when a portable battery exploded, frightening and intoxicating the pupils and teacher present in the classroom at the time. Police officers intervened on the spot, a medical car and two ambulances, who visited the fifty-seven-year-old teacher and seven pupils between the ages of 15 and 16, transferring three of them to the emergency room.
Two entered the green code at the De Marchi hospital due to mild smoke poisoning, while a student, who arrived at the San Raffaele ps, needed immediate health carenot because of the intoxication caused by the smoke of the powerbank but for one panic crisis triggered by the event: its conditions, the operations center said, would not be worrying.
A powerbank exploded at the Professional Institute of Services for Food, Wine and Hospitality in via Valvassori Peroni 8 set the backpack on fire inside which it was kept. The investigations will clarify the contours of the story, but it is possible that the portable battery was damaged or lacking the protection systems that prevent dangerous situations like this, when a power bank under load overheats to the point of igniting or exploding.
Batteries are devices that convert chemical energy into electrical energy, and if not used with caution e kept “at bay” from adequate protection systems they can become small bombs. The sensors that guarantee their safety are integrated in a very large part of cases, always in quality products and sometimes in cheaper ones. It is always advisable to check before buying one, but the advice is to don’t compromise on the price of potentially risky products such as power banks.
We recall on the sidelines that three years ago a burning power bank forced a Virgin Atlantic flight to an emergency landing. Fortunately, no one was injured in that episode.
