Osaka is a modern city with 2.5 million residents in the Kansai region of Japan. It has a flourishing consumer economy with fine retail stores including a Kohnan Senri Yamada branch. The latter stocks a wide range of consumer products including – you guessed it – lithium batteries. On November 28, 2018 ten button batteries burned the 32,291 square foot store.
How Could Ten Button Batteries Manage That?
We can only assume Kohnan Senri Yamada has a shoplifting problem, because it apparently anti-theft tags button batteries individually. For some reason, staff removed the ten button batteries from display without removing the anti-theft devices.
A security camera watched someone place them in a bag and leave them on a shelf on the first floor. Perhaps they were hoping to help themselves later, who knows. Early in the morning of November 28, 2018, a security camera watched sparks coming from the bag. It recorded the fire spreading to the check out. If it sent out an alarm, which we doubt, nobody apparently responded.
The Astounding Punch the Lithium Batteries Packed
Authorities evacuated preschool children and senior citizens in nursing care as the blaze spread. Firefighters took ten hours to control it. A store official told police “We store ten or so discarded anti-theft tags in a bag,”
No one is saying what caused the ten button batteries to remain attached to tags in the bag. Perhaps the police will discover why, when they investigate further.
Whatever the case, ten batteries still containing energy ended up in a heap with their terminals apparently exposed. Two must have touched.
Or else the anti-theft tags were conductors and one caused a short in a battery circuit. A Tokyo National Institute of Technology and Evaluation official commented, “When storing batteries, people should take some measures. For example, they should put tape on the electrodes, to prevent them from directly touching each other.”
The remaining question is, why were the button batteries – apparently stock – removed from their protective packaging when this could have prevented the incident? We publish this information in the interests of public education and safety. Come back soon for more essential consumer tips and battery news.
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