PlaneGard Announces a New, Larger PlaneGard PED

HighWater Innovations, makers of Personal Electronic Device (PED) onboard aircraft fire containment products, announced the introduction of a larger version of their PlaneGard PED Fire Containment Case. The PlaneGard PG350 has been designed to handle laptops with screens up to 17” diagonal.  “Since the introduction of the PlaneGard 250 in 2014, PlaneGard continues to be the best option for dealing with an on-board PED fire,” says HighWater Partner, Michael Gilchrist. “PlaneGard is the only ‘capture and contain’ technology available that allows a quick, safe and repeatable process to control the fire event and in almost all cases with no physical contact.”

The company says sales of its standard case, the
PG250, are growing, and it became apparent in late
2014 that corporate operators needed to
accommodate larger size laptops that are not
normally carried on-board commercial aircraft.
“There are those business passengers than just cannot work on a small computer screen, and that is where the PlaneGard PG350 is the perfect solution, ”says Partner George Brilmyer. This new PG350 model features the same revolutionary capture device (aka ‘the scoop’) that is an integral part of the PlaneGard technology but has been increased to an internal size of 16” x 12” x 2”. The smoking/burning PED is simply ‘scooped up’ and safely dropped into the insulated PlaneGard case where the flames, smoke and toxic fumes are isolated and contained.

Whether water is then added, or not, the event is safely contained.

Lithium ion fires are particularly vigorous and normal methods of fighting them are ineffective. In addition to the fire there is the potential for explosion. Copious amounts of toxic organic vapors will be released as well. These vapors irritate the eyes, nose and throat and even more dangerous is that they can be ignited. PlaneGard is the only technology that completely contains the fire, explosion, toxic vapor, heat, and odor involved in such a fire event. With the fire completely contained, the flight crew can make a better decision as to whether the flight has to be diverted. Flexible bags do not contain the toxic organic vapor or smoke or odor.

Conservative sources indicate that there have been close to 200 such fire events related to Personal Electronic Device (PED) batteries over the last ten years. The rate of these incidents is increasing in the more recent years as the number of PEDs (laptop computers, smart phones, Tablet PC’s, e-readers, MP3 players, etc.) that passengers carry on board aircraft has grown significantly. The airline industry recently estimated that since the typical passenger carries multiple PEDs, they each bring an average of 4.5 Li-ion cells onto each flight. (NOTE: a typical single aisle, narrow body aircraft with 100 passengers will have about 500 lithium ion cells on board). The risk is growing. PlaneGard is the solution to mitigate the risk.

For more information related to PED fires see the PlaneGard website at www.PlaneGard.com.

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