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?

Question

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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Answer 1

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.