Tirupati: A large consignment of mobile phones in the luggage compartment of the Vemuri Kaveri Travels bus may have significantly intensified the inferno and accelerated the loss of lives, it has emerged. A consignment of 234 new smartphones was being transported in the bus going to Bengaluru from Hyderabad. Preliminary investigation revealed that a Hyderabad-based businessman, identified as Manganath, was transporting the consignment of mobile phones, worth approximately Rs 46 lakh, Kurnool police said. The fire, which was triggered when the speeding bus ran over a stationary bike and dragged it for a distance causing the bike's fuel tank to explode, quickly spread to the luggage area. The extreme heat caused the lithium-ion batteries in the smartphones to undergo "thermal runaway"

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