Why in international flights nowadays if passengers drop electronic devices they are not allowed to look for the devices themselves, but instead they need to inform a flight attendant?
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Because the battery in devices is volatile and moving the seats poses a risk to crushing the device and damaging the battery which can lead to fire.
You can look for it, but they don’t want you to adjust your seat. The concern is that the phone could fall out of your pocket and into the seat hinge. Then if you adjust the seat the phone could easily get crushed by the lever action of the seat. Nearly every modern phone uses a lipo battery that is composed of several layers of chemicals separated by thin sheets. If you crush the battery these chemicals can come into contact with each other and start a fire.
Such an incident happened on a British airways flight in 2020 leading to the new recommendations.
It has nothing to do with international flights and whether or not you’re allowed to is country specific. In the U.S., (at least on the flights I’ve been on) if it’s even mentioned, it’s more of a suggestion, but Australia takes it much more seriously.
The idea in countries that have this rule/suggestion is that there have been a handful of instances of people dropping phones in between plane seats and the mechanism that reclines the seat punctured the battery and caused fires, so asking a crew member to get the device for you is supposed to reduce that risk.
It’s because there’s sensitive or high voltage electronic equipment under the seat. They don’yt want you to get hurt or damage anything. [Seat electronics.](https://ibb.co/6YKs3Tb) This is under a first class seat. I’m a mechanic and gave been asked to find many different things like rings, airpods, passports etc.
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