Samsung investigates battery exploding in man’s pants

A man in South Korea has been taken to hospital with second degree burns, after his Samsung Note battery exploded. KitGuru fires up a Napster playlist that includes Donna Summer's ‘Hot Stuff' and takes a closer look at the phenomenon of overheating and exploding items in the trouser region.

Anyone that's used a cell phone, has probably heard of overheating batteries. It's a known thing with the Lithium Ion batteries that are so popular with modern mobiles.

We know several people who have had to get replacement Blackberrys because of this issue. The user suddenly becomes aware that the phone is really hot – and in no time at all the battery has been completely discharged.

Funny, we can't remember seeing this marked as a ‘keeps you warm in winter' feature on any of the phone maker's adverts.

If anything, it's a bit of a surprise that serious injury doesn't happen more often – given how many millions of smartphones there are now in the world.

You may have heard of Boeing's Dreamliner being grounded in Japan due to on board fires etc. Apparently, these have also been traced to exploding batteries.

So how bad can these explosions get?

Well, if you roll the clock back to February 2009, CNET reported an incident from China where an unfortunate chap had his Nokia explode and sever an artery in his neck. He bled out before doctors could save him.

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KitGuru says: With something like 1 billion of these phone batteries in circulation, it's hard to take a few dozen injuries seriously. While we sympathise with those that have been injured – the ratio shows that you have a similar chance of harm from your phone as, say, a meteor – but no one around here is planning to sell anti-meteor umbrellas or special ‘anti-space-nugget' insurance. If your phone begins to overheat, we recommend that you ask your service provider to replace the battery immediately.

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