That's absurd.. we have those today too. They're called bicycles.
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Battery Fire Discussion
- Thread starter SMAlset
- Start date
I was thinking about this this morning and also wondered about the time difference between when he said the tire pressure warning happened somewhere along Hwy 17 and when he got picked up and had the car brought to the Los Gatos tire shop (for those out of the area Hwy 17 runs through the town of Los Gatos and Hwy 17 is heavily traveled and traffic can move very slowly depending on direction and time of day; and for locals, the tire shop is down from Campo di Bocce and a bit futher down from the Los Gatos Superchargers).
As you mentioned with the wait for the tow, it could take some time before reaching the shop. Just going from the junction of Hwys 9 and 17 in morning traffic to the shop 2 miles away, google says can take about 45 minutes and we don't know where he was on 17 when he pulled over. The battery fire in the Hwy 101 accident in Mt. View happened fairly soon after the collision as I recall reading and after his rescuers had quickly freed him from the car. All this leads me to question how quickly thermal runaway happens from a breach of the battery pack. I am sure we will be hearing about issues like this down the road from other BEV manufacturers as well when their cars are involved in fires. No doubt research into preventing or better managing thermal runaway is ongoing.
From something I either read or heard on the news last night, the owner has owned a few Teslas before this one so wasn't new to EVs. I'm glad no one was hurt. While I can understand his reaction to buying another car, unlike him I don't feel dissuaded at all to own a Tesla. Having seen crashed Teslas in the press, and a number of those in very bad crashes, and only a handful have had fire issues I don't see this as a reason to stay away from a car that has done a great job protecting it's drivers and occupants.
I'm sure at some point after the car data is collected, the body inspected and timeline figured out, we'll be told what triggered this.
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gavine
Petrol Head turned EV Enthusiast
Why didn't they use Tesla roadside assistance where they fix the tire right there and not have to tow it to a shop?
I'm still waiting to hear about the cause of the McCormack fire from June.
In one incident, it took Tesla less than 1 month to figure out a battery fire was caused by a bullet to the battery pack.
Lead story on noon news on KPIX5/CBS here in the Bay area. The fire dept spokesman said that this was their first battery fire so they have a learning curve. Did say that they were on the phone with Tesla for a while and it was the fire depts call when to move the car to storage. The video clip of the owner in this news segment said it was his wife who said no more Teslas.
Here's more on the circumstances and how the fire department handled it (video I saw during the broadcast):
Tesla Reignites After Flames Put Out From Earlier Incident In South Bay
Right after they ran this story, the next one was how city officials were celebrating the opening of the Alameda Superchargers with a ribbon cutting. Did also mention that no Tesla officials were present to ask questions about the fire that happened the day before.
Here's more on the circumstances and how the fire department handled it (video I saw during the broadcast):
Tesla Reignites After Flames Put Out From Earlier Incident In South Bay
Right after they ran this story, the next one was how city officials were celebrating the opening of the Alameda Superchargers with a ribbon cutting. Did also mention that no Tesla officials were present to ask questions about the fire that happened the day before.
Yeah, for sure. The battery pack on the S/X is super rigid. You're not going to damage the batteries/cells by improper jacking. You can put marks in the casing with a crappy jack or something, but you're not causing a battery fire with improper jacking.
The 3 is a *little* different. The bottom of the casing doesn't appear quite as rigid, and it also has a relatively thin cover under there in the center that protects HV wiring. Would still be pretty difficult to cause any damage with a jack though I'd be willing to bet.
My first thought when I saw this article was that the tow driver was hooking the subframe of the car and at some point may have punctured the thin steel cover of the top front two "hump" battery modules. Not 100% sure why anyone would hook the car that way, but I've seen wrecker drivers do all sorts of crazy stuff. It's the only immediate way I can think of a fire starting after a tow.
@wk057 thanks for checking in. Have a few questions for you if I can ask. What kind of info do you think they might be able to gather from this based on the condition you see? Will they be able to see any puncture point in the pack or has the heat of the fire and exploding batteries warped the metal? Can they tell from data when the battery started to experience issues? I assume since the driver only mentioned seeing the tire pressure alerts that anything else that was sent happened after he left the car. Will they be able to pinpoint the location of the car when this happened, ie. still on Hwy 17 or on University Avenue for example? Could one tell if someone used the tow hook and would the car show if it was put in Tow Mode? So much of the technical end people have questions on so your insight really helps educate us. Thanks.
Ghosty
Member
I was thinking the tow may have contributed to the fire but your logic makes more sense. Whatever caused the flat tire may be a culprit in the "hissing" sound that led to the fire.
Either way - tow or debris - let's hope it isn't another bright owner who shoots into the car and lies about it.
Ghosty
Member
When it is a Tesla - very rare - it makes national headlines. When it is a gas car - local news only. List: Kia, Hyundai Models Drivers Say Are Catching Fire
I have friends at the local volunteer fire department. Tesla has outreach people that brought cars for them to see and train them on this, and the battery cut loops. It is not left to chance.
Towing companies are a different problem. I guess that’s why Tesla says call them...
I was just mentioning the Kia - Hyundai car fires to my husband after the Los Gatos fire happened. He hadn't seen the news but I had. Thanks for the link. Will save me time pointing him to it.
After the fatal Model X crash happened, among the multitude of discussion pages of posts about it on TMC, someone had linked to a car testing facility report (not sure who the group was but a major name) where the wrecked cars were sometimes found to burst into flames unexpectedly after testing after having been parked. There were cars involved that weren't Teslas. Not that I think that reports like this one with the MS should be ignored but I do agree that the press doesn't cover them equally, and because Tesla - for good or bad - garners people's attention, they intentionally give it prominence to serve as clickbait. From news reports on this incident I've read, it generally starts off with the guy had a flat tire and then his Tesla caught on fire. The press knows what kind of impression that creates to readers and that details surrounding what happened don't get mentioned until many paragraphs down the page, if at all. I generally have to read several sources to get a bigger picture. It would be great and actually educational for readers if there was a reporter on these type of stories who actually understood BEVs and knew what questions to ask when reporting incidents like this.
I am curious how exactly the car was brought in to the tire shop - tow truck or flatbed.
Cirrus MS100D
Member
Another frustrating angle is that no matter the cause (and I strongly suspect something “else” happened here that was VERY out of the ordinary to cause this...) it will never receive the coverage that the initial episode received.
And so it goes...
And so it goes...
Ulmo
Active Member
I saw not one, but two gasoline car fires December 8-9 coming home. Did those make national news?
Ulmo
Active Member
Indeed! I've been on that route when I've called for their tire service and it was quite nice to have. If the driver couldn't use tire service, something much worse must have been wrong.
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Ulmo
Active Member
That area has had hundreds of Teslas come by per day for many years, and possibly thousands per day now, and this is their FIRST such experience?
In the net of well balanced reactions, I don't think all the people who died in gasoline car fires will be claiming the gas cars are safer. I'd like to see side by side comparison between miles driven and car fires for gasoline vs. Tesla.[/QUOTE]
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They said they had training on EVs but never had an actual car on fire like this to respond to. Since this is the Bay area and as you said hundreds of Teslas traveling through everyday, for Santa Clara County Fire not to have had a battery fire on a Tesla to respond to I'd say that's pretty interesting and why this incident doesn't have me worrying about either of our cars catching fire. I hate the news has made it seem like the fire was triggered by a flat tire. Some people won't give a second thought to that and just accept it on face value.
The shock of news reporters that the car could catch on fire again, goes to show how little people know about EVs. Given that they will be increasing in numbers on the road in the coming years, I think they'd be smart to get educated before reporting.
Ulmo
Active Member
I've been looking at some of the local news reports of this.
1. The fire started 10 minutes after towing to the tire repair location to repair a tire.
2. Here is from a photo of the video of the fire from a report being tweeted on Twitter:
Notice the fire is in the front.
I think the type of event that would puncture a tire that would also puncture the battery pack could happen by the punctured tire near the front of the car. The car could have met a piece of junk metal at highway speeds which punctured both. Needing a tow from Hwy 17 in the flat urban areas is an unusual type of tire problem; most tire problems would prompt a Tesla driver to pull off the highway and get to a safe town business parking lot where they could safely call Tesla tire repair service without nearby traffic. Needing a tow from that highway means something much worse than a mere flat tire.
I wonder if they were stuck up somewhere by the tighter mountainous areas where they couldn't safely pull off, if somehow the much faster but not Tesla-specific responding tow truck could have attached incorrectly.
1. The fire started 10 minutes after towing to the tire repair location to repair a tire.
2. Here is from a photo of the video of the fire from a report being tweeted on Twitter:
Notice the fire is in the front.
I think the type of event that would puncture a tire that would also puncture the battery pack could happen by the punctured tire near the front of the car. The car could have met a piece of junk metal at highway speeds which punctured both. Needing a tow from Hwy 17 in the flat urban areas is an unusual type of tire problem; most tire problems would prompt a Tesla driver to pull off the highway and get to a safe town business parking lot where they could safely call Tesla tire repair service without nearby traffic. Needing a tow from that highway means something much worse than a mere flat tire.
I wonder if they were stuck up somewhere by the tighter mountainous areas where they couldn't safely pull off, if somehow the much faster but not Tesla-specific responding tow truck could have attached incorrectly.
seattlite2004
Active Member
I'm thinking Thermal Runaway of the battery pack/cells are much more dramatic and different than a typical ICE fire....like fireworks dramatic...thus making news. From Rich Rebuilds...nice view of the fireworks @6:11
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This post can not be left to stand unchallenged. I don't believe someone could in good faith post this as informational.
The average car age on the roads in the USA is nearly 12 years, to the tune of over 254MILLION on the road in the USA. The choice to use the 6m number is at least as dishonest as the media coverage.
Now if we use the 254m number vs. the 175,000 that is ballpark 1:1451.
Tesla has something over 200K on the road in the USA based on the tax credit going away, with the M3 volume in the mix let's just ballpark it 250k which at the 1:1451 ratio would mean 172 fires per year so one every other day-ish BUT that ignores my earlier point that the average car on the road is pushing 12 years old. If we are to make any effort to be honest I think more old neglected abused cobbled cars catch fire than new, yes some new cars catch fire but that 175k number you like does not reflect that it is aggregate new and old mechanical failures parked crash damage and incompetent repairs. So we can not even use the 1:1451 ratio to HONESTLY compare. The average Tesla on the road is I would guess under 2 years old due to M3 volume diluting the older Model S numbers.
Now Teslas do catch fire at a low rate I am not arguing they catch fire a lot, I am saying let's be honest in our conversation.
At one time my car of choice was the mid 90s General Motors b-bodies Caprice, Roadmaster, Fleetwood, the 94 and I believe early 95 models had zinc auxiliary battery terminals, these were known to build heat, melt wiring and some did catch fire in garages, prompting a service bulletin for replacement with brass terminal that didn't corrode and overheat. That was an electrical fire in an ICE completely unrelated to liquid fuel, with a small low load electrical system You think this is possible that a 400volt system capable of the output it has could have issues a dedade or 15 years down the road with some corrosion and wear in terminals?
As per usual, a Tesla car under the microscope and no one cares how many ICE cars burst into flames on a daily basis.
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