Crashes are infrequent, but are catastrophic when they do happen.
If people manage to survive an impact, the biggest danger is fire. Passengers have little time to make a quick getaway from the cramped, crowded aisles before being overcome by smoke and flame. The discovery that a thermoplastic polymer degrades into a material almost impervious to fire when heated may be what FAA has been looking for. Westmoreland PHA has been known for decades. Until recently, chemists had only suspected that PHA decomposed into PBO and water when heated.