A woman suffered agonising burns after her battery-operated headphones spontaneously combusted during a flight From Beijing to Australia.
The Australian Transport Safety Board (ATSB) has described how the passenger was listening to music on her own headphones as she dozed when there was a sudden loud explosion.
“As I went to turn around I felt burning on my face,” she told the ATSB during their investigation of the incident.
“I just grabbed my face which caused the headphones to go around my neck. I continued to feel burning so I grabbed them off and threw them on the floor.
“They were sparking and had small amounts of fire.”
Flight attendants rushed to help and poured water on the headphones, which ended up melted and stuck to the floor.
Pictures show the woman, who was not named, with a blackened face and neck and blisters on her hands.
While nobody else was hurt, her fellow fliers had to endure the smell of melted plastic and burnt hair for the rest of the flight.
“People were coughing and choking the entire way home,” the woman added.
The ATSB, which did not identify which airline was involved, concluded that the lithium-ion batteries were at fault for the fire.
“As the range of products using batteries grows, the potential for in-flight issues increases,” a spokesman said.
He added that spare batteries should be kept in carry-on luggage.
Last year, many airlines banned Samsung Galaxy Note 7 smartphones over fire risk concerns, following reports of exploding batteries.
The South Korean electronics giant was forced to recall all of its Note 7s, at a cost of billions of dollars.