AMEN! Iam so tired of all the doom and gloom about batteries.
Has anyone actually been hurt by one, maybe other than some minor first degree hand burns?
Yes, definitely. I haven't gone looking; some of the members who've been here longer, or those who are more motivated to search, would have a better idea of the range of injuries so far. but there has been blood from lens shrapnel, and I believe there were some more serious injuries involving a light exploding in someone's hand. You might start
here.
If this is in your hand when something happens, the first thing your going to do is drop the light and step away....Its not a bomb, most lights are so overbuilt they handle the pressure and the o-rings go letting gasses escape....
It
is a bomb, sometimes -- the lens shrapnel incident mentioned above happened
after the user dropped the light on the ground. The nasty in-light accidents, though, seem to be more from Lithium primaries being reverse charged. Lithium-ion (specifically LiCo, the most common, and dangerous, of the Li-ion chemistries in use) tend to have more safety issues when charging -- although an explosion or fire on the charger may be caused by bad treatment in the light. (But maybe this contrast is simply because Lithium batteries are used more, or used more carelessly, and because they never have issues on the charger; I certainly won't presume that Li-ions are less dangerous in the light, given abuse.)
Honestly, though, the issues with 10440s seem to me
rather overrated by some, because 10440s are the
safest common unprotected Li-ion cells: they have the least stored energy, they have the least thermal resistance to the flashlight, and they live in the smallest, and hence typically strongest, hosts. They also, being easy to abuse, are probably the single most abused Li-ion cell size around, and yet I've heard of no "incidents" (not counting death after 10s of cycles) involving them. (Like I said, though, I haven't really looked.)
I certainly don't think a warning to those who may be abusing 10440s unaware is out of line, but once they know what they're doing, and accept whatever risks they're taking, I say just let them do it, and I see absolutely nothing more "inherently dangerous" with a 10440 than any other Li-ion, if adequate protection is provided externally (same as any other unprotected cell).