Overheated, pocketed PSP burns through child's pants

[psp4lyf]

A word of warning: you may want to refrain from placing your Sony PlayStation Portable in your pocket, even if it's switched off.Harold Clay of Warner Middle School in Farmington Hills, Michigan suffered second-degree burns when the PSP in his pocket caught fire and burned a hole in his pants.

Fortunately, a teacher was somehow able to separate the portable from Clay in time. Clay's mother, Sheila, reported how her son managed to avoid greater injury during the fiery accident:


He said it wasn't a gradual heat. It really started heating up. He's always been taught, burn- fire- smoke, you drop and you roll. So, he was in his band class and he dropped and rolled.


Ironically, the game inside the player when the incident occurred was one of the titles from the Burnout series of games. Clay's parents were puzzled by the fact that the PSP was purportedly switched off the whole time.

Clay's parents said they plan to contact Sony to check if any similar incidents have been reported by other people.

original link: Overheated, pocketed PSP burns through child's pants - PlayStation Portable News - PSP Updates

[pokey8349]

that poor PSP

lol joke

But seriously, that is kind of expected to happen though - electronics heating up - weird I know that it heated up in his pants as it was off

Anyone remember the Nokia (mobile phone company) when they said their batteries were at risk for doing this?

They should make electronics safer

[VeryThinPSP]

That is weird. You think maybe he was treating his psp badly and it got mad at him?

[psp4lyf]

That is weird. You think maybe he was treating his psp badly and it got mad at him?

lol he was probably abusing it and playing DS. "The revenge of the psp"

[Intergalactic Captain]

Standard thing when it comes to li-ion batteries...Remeber the tens of milions of battries recalled by every laptop manufacturer over the last couple of years? Same problem - Some li-ion batteries are poorly made...A pinhole in the foil covering may not seem like much, but over a few days/weeks/months, moisture from the air leaks in and reacts with the lithium. Heat is produced as this happens, and once a critical point is reached, the whole thing reacts and goes up in flames.

Never heard of it happening to a psp battery though...From the ones I've taken apart, the foil seems pretty thick, probably designed for the sole purpose of preventing something like this.

On a side note, though, perhaps we should think about revising the "stop, drop, and roll" thing to "remove your pants," considering how many 8 year olds these days are running around with pockets full of celphones and electronic toys.

[Daxmaurier]

""A pinhole in the foil covering may not seem like much, but over a few days/weeks/months, moisture from the air leaks in and reacts with the lithium. Heat is produced as this happens, and once a critical point is reached, the whole thing reacts and goes up in flames.""

NOw all i can think about is the Pandora battery I have sittin on the shelf at home, then yes, has a tiny hole in the foil
I don't suppose I can just put a peice of tape over it? lol

[Khaos Dragoon]

I seriously doubt that the psp was turned off. Even if it was turned on, he must've done something to either overclock his psp or there was an extremely faulty connection like a piece of metal stuck in one of the battery's contacts or something like that.

[Intergalactic Captain]

Dax - if you damaged the li-ion cell itself in any way, do yourself a favor and get rid of it sooner rather than later. A piece of tape may be sufficient, but I'd rather err on the side of caution. Think about it this way - What happens when you try to put an alkali metal fire with water?...It blows up in your face.

As for the kid, I'm not so sure I'd say that he had to have done something...Cel-phone batteries blow up every once in a while unprovoked, as do laptop batteries. The only difference here is that it's the first reported case with the PSP.

A safe bet is that any Li-ion battery will lose 50% of its capacity in 3 years whether its being used or not. Considering this kid was in band practice and wasn't smart enough to take the psp out of his pocket when it went up, I'm guessing he's pretty young. Kids that young have expensive toys because their parents want them to be happy/fit in with everyone else/shut the hell up and let mommy drink/etc... My bet is that he's had the PSP since launch, and that's the original battery. If this is the case, it would surely have lost some of its capacity...This leads to more frequent and less efficient charging, stressing out the battery. This increases the chances of forming an internal short, which probably happened. Internal short = heat, causing expansion of the electrolytes, and the cell to expand. From here, either one of the seals failed or a pin in the battery circuitry popped the foil. Already warm, the exposed lithium would be much more reactive...This is the culmination point, where all the little things add up - As soon as the lithium touches moist air, you get a self-catalytic chain reaction that consumes everything in short order.

Just my guess, but that's the way I see it happening. Either that, or the kid fucked up a pandora hard-mod...Which I find doubtful, simply due to the fact that the idiot did the stop-drop-roll with it STILL IN HIS POCKET! Granted, emergencies tend to take away ones sensibilities, but still...WTF?!?!

[NuMB3Rs]

saw this yesterday. pretty messed up.

[BravePotato7]

Dax - if you damaged the li-ion cell itself in any way, do yourself a favor and get rid of it sooner rather than later. A piece of tape may be sufficient, but I'd rather err on the side of caution. Think about it this way - What happens when you try to put an alkali metal fire with water?...It blows up in your face.

As for the kid, I'm not so sure I'd say that he had to have done something...Cel-phone batteries blow up every once in a while unprovoked, as do laptop batteries. The only difference here is that it's the first reported case with the PSP.

A safe bet is that any Li-ion battery will lose 50% of its capacity in 3 years whether its being used or not. Considering this kid was in band practice and wasn't smart enough to take the psp out of his pocket when it went up, I'm guessing he's pretty young. Kids that young have expensive toys because their parents want them to be happy/fit in with everyone else/shut the hell up and let mommy drink/etc... My bet is that he's had the PSP since launch, and that's the original battery. If this is the case, it would surely have lost some of its capacity...This leads to more frequent and less efficient charging, stressing out the battery. This increases the chances of forming an internal short, which probably happened. Internal short = heat, causing expansion of the electrolytes, and the cell to expand. From here, either one of the seals failed or a pin in the battery circuitry popped the foil. Already warm, the exposed lithium would be much more reactive...This is the culmination point, where all the little things add up - As soon as the lithium touches moist air, you get a self-catalytic chain reaction that consumes everything in short order.

Just my guess, but that's the way I see it happening. Either that, or the kid fucked up a pandora hard-mod...Which I find doubtful, simply due to the fact that the idiot did the stop-drop-roll with it STILL IN HIS POCKET! Granted, emergencies tend to take away ones sensibilities, but still...WTF?!?!

Pretty good observations, I agree. Oh well

[sam31183]

I seriously think that what happened was either him or a friend of his tried to pandora that battery at school and didnt know what they where doing, yah, he said it was turned off...but we know how that goes with the pb in. I also doubt a 8 year old has owned a psp for 3, almost 4 years now....wait, it didnt say in the article how old he is...but he was in middle school...so like 12 or younger...still doubt he has had one since launch. I know I wouldnt trust a kid that young with a 300 dollar handheld....but then again i am not stupid rich.

[GenJackson]

wow, i keep mine in my pocket all the time, and i bought it used, creepy.

[Andromeda]

Lucky kid got a day off school!

and i feel kinda sorry for the PSP... lol j/k

[greendragonslim]

I love how the game in the psp was burnout...
"it's better to burn out, then fade away"

[Sullivan]

i guess im the only one that finds it hillarious.
i cant even imagine just sitting in class, and out of nowhere a kid just drops to the floor and starts rolling, then the game is burnout. to damn funny!!

pocket is hot so im gonna roll on the floor, take the damn thing out genius.