California firefighters had to douse a flaming battery in a Tesla Semi with about 50,000 gallons (190,000 liters) of water to extinguish flames after a crash, the National Transportation Safety Board said Thursday.
In addition to the huge amount of water, firefighters used an aircraft to drop fire retardant on the “immediate area” of the electric truck as a precautionary measure, the agency said in a preliminary report.
Firefighters said previously that the battery reached temperatures of 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit (540 Celsius) while it was in flames.
The NTSB sent investigators to the Aug. 19 crash along Interstate 80 near Emigrant Gap, about 70 miles (113 kilometers) northeast of Sacramento. The agency said it would look into fire risks posed by the truck’s large lithium-ion battery.
And morons keep buying Teslas.
It really seems like Elon Musk has been given free reign to kill people.
It’s any lithium battery, not just one evil villain. At least you’re not recharging your car inside the living space of your house, like your computer or phone or e-bike or e-scooter or vacuum cleaner
Personally I think there’s a market for a fire proof container for charging batteries. I’ve been thinking about stacking cinder blocks in my basement for charging yardcare and tool batteries such that they couldn’t catch anything just in case
Wasn’t aware. I think that’s a great idea, honestly. Keep yourself safe.
This is not a Tesla problem. This is electric vehicle problem.
My local fire department once had to put out the same VW Buzz 3 times because it kept re-igniting. Nowdays they have containers filled with water that they completely submerge electric vehicles into that had caught fire.
It’s a Tesla problem in that it is a bumrushing tech that hasn’t matured for what it’s being used for because profit motive.
And no, if the tech isn’t mature to be both useful AND safe in the event of failure operating in the world, it belongs in the lab, not up for sale.
We shouldn’t be mass producing any vehicles that become bombs/environmental disasters that standard fire and rescue can’t appropriately address with reasonable tools upon crashing, because they inevitably will.
Its a market capitalism problem. Fire, ready, aim because rush the pos to sale. Musk is certainly a standard bearer as a prominent “get government and society’s wellbeing out of the way of my quarterly profit expectations” asshole sociopath capitalist.
We don’t have time to perfect and mature the tech though. That was 40 years ago. Now it’s whatever fucking works that isn’t fossil fuels and burning of them. It’s a damn sight safer than an ICE which is actually carrying extremely combustible liquids in it too. It’s not perfect but it’s better and this kind of " we have to hold off" is effectively supporting the status quo which is fuckig everything up as it is.
I hear you, and that’s a valid point, but I see that more as a function of our insatiable need for the primary driver of our destruction: growth/metastasis.
Growth is precisely what is destroying us. We need to find homeostasis with this world. We need to slow down, stop expanding supply chains, and work on making what powers these 100% clean first and foremost. Because right now, most electrics are functionally dirty too, their pollution just happens higher up the chain.
We won’t do that of course, because the reality is most people in the developed world need to accept that wasteful things like fast food, ridiculous amounts of meat, and plastic that serves no necessary purpose, everything from pop figures to disposable water bottles available to people with reusable vessels out of convenience, need to be made illegal yesterday if we want our species to have a decent future.
But our creature comforts are more important to us, and we will punish any politicians that try to call for genuine sacrifice. 🔥🤷🔥
Entirely valid and I agree that continual growth is right at the heart of most of our problems. I guess most of my frustration comes from the fact we’ve had at least 40 years of warning, 20 more years of proper, severe warning and promises for action and now that we’re seeing day in, day out that all the warnings were right, we’re still not moving with any real purpose. I genuinely thought that COVID would show us what we need to do and how we could do it but nope, slipped right back into business as usual.
I think your feelings toward Elon may be clouding your judgement here a bit. Putting out electric vehicle fire is hard, independent of the brand of the vehicle.
To be fair, won’t this be an issue for all EVs?
Good point. I’m not sure. It may be that we’re (I’m) hearing more about Teslas catching fire because they’re the largest distributor in the US (and I live here). However, they’re not the largest in the world and I haven’t heard of this problem happening with other EVs (though they may be).
Regardless, Elon Musk is a pompous charlatan and defrauder that deserves much worse than he’ll ever get. Bias be damned.
You don’t hear about them because Western media doesn’t make as big a deal about them.
If you can throw the word Tesla or Elon on something it gets plastered everywhere, including here.
Same with recalls.
Tesla recalls something software related like the unbuckled seat belt chime not working if you do steps A B then C and its huge news. Within the next 2 weeks 5 or 6 other major OEMs do recalls and you barely hear about it. And yes, recalls happen in groups like that where other OEMs wait for someone to go first and take the bigger hit.
That’s fair. I fully acknowledge my limited scope/understanding and bias.
I wish we lived in a better world with better intentioned people overall. It’s easy to focus on Elon Musk because he’s the biggest/loudest dragon, hoarding the most gold. There are others just like him everywhere. It’s depressing and overwhelming.
I’m not a fan of cars in general, but understand their necessity in plenty of situations. EVs have great potential, but need good-intentioned engineers with plenty of oversight to safely fuel their development. I’m sure these companies have some brilliant scientific minds in there and they should be allowed to usher in a new age of invention, not limited by the bottom line of vampiric shareholders and the egos of CEOs. It’s just so sad.
Pretty much ya.
Not specific to cars but it’s sad to think about what we could have had if we let these people build things properly. So many things don’t happen due to money. Inventions and knowledge getting bought and squashed as it’d interfere with the bigger companies plans etc.