Major airport introduces strict rule on hand luggage item affecting 580,000 Brits

Authorities in Singapore have announced a limit of two power banks per passenger on flights to reduce risks for travellers.

The new rule will come into effect from April 15, and any additional power banks will have to be surrendered before people board their plane, the Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore has said in a statement.

CAAS also advised power banks shouldn’t be charged onboard the aircraft and that passengers shouldn’t be using them to charge their other devices while flying.

This is already the case on all Singapore Airlines flights after it banned the use of these chargers in March 2025. But these blanket changes are set to affect more of the roughly 580,000 Brits who visit Singapore each year, according to Travel Weekly.

This change comes after the International Civil Aviation Organisation updated its global safety guidelines on April 2 to a new requirement of two power banks per passenger.

Not to mention, Japan’s Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism recently banned the use of this tech on flights departing or arriving to its airports.

Emirates also rolled out a blanket ban prohibiting passengers from using power banks onboard in October, while Lufthansa became the first European airline to do so in January this year.

Officials are working with airlines operating out of Singapore’s Changi Airport to ‘implement the new requirements in a smooth and orderly manner’.

It’s the airlines who are expected to inform passengers travelling with them of the new requirements.

‘CAAS will provide some time for the airlines to do so and for passengers to familiarise themselves and have the requirements take effect only from 15 April, 2026,’ a Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore spokesperson said. ‘In the meantime, passenger service and security screening officers will be trained.’

Reminders will also be displayed across the airport to avoid any confusion.

‘The new requirements will help reduce the risk of fire caused by power banks on board flights,’ Foong Ling Huei, director of Flight Standards at CAAS, says. ‘We urge all passengers to familiarise themselves and comply with the new requirements, for their own safety and the safety of other passengers.’

Why are power banks a problem on planes?

If a lithium-ion battery is damaged, misused, or stored improperly, it can short circuit — triggering a process called ‘thermal runaway’ where the batteries start to irreversibly overheat.

The result can be a sudden, violent, and explosive fire, hence why the European Union Aviation Safety Agency advise only putting these in your hand luggage, and not your checked baggage.

Concerns about allowing passengers to keep power banks in the cabin initially began to grow following an incident in January 2025, when a portable power bank caused a fire that engulfed and destroyed a passenger plane in South Korea.

First discovered by a flight attendant in an overhead luggage bin, the flames quickly spread throughout the entire cabin. Thankfully, everyone onboard was evacuated safely.

But this wasn’t an isolated incident.

An Air China flight suffered a similar fate in October last year after a power bank stored inside carry-on luggage caught fire, but cabin crew put the fire out while the plane made an emergency landing.

According to the National Institute of Technology and Evaluation in Japan, portable battery chargers caused 123 fires in 2024, an increase of more than 150% from the 47 fires reported in 2020.

Moreover, the Japanese fire agency, stated that by product type, power banks accounted for 30% of the 290 incidents in 2024, followed by power tools at 89 and mobile phones at 85.

While flights pose an exaggerated risk, given the intense pressure, faulty lithium-ion batteries can be lethal in all kinds of environments.

So, with all this in mind, it’s not surprising that more and more government bodies are cracking down on these particularly feisty fire hazards.

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