Model 3 caught fire in china garage [after hitting a manhole cover]

[1965Falcon]

As a civil engineer in the manhole business I'm not totally familiar with practices in China, but if they are anything even remotely like the US the chance of a cover being dislodged by driving over it is pretty slim. More than likely, the issues was poor construction and settlement occured around the manhole (the manhole is supported by deeper soils) and the surrounding pavement dropped and the manhole lid then protruded above the roadway as a result. I see this on occasion but rarely it's left unfixed for long in the US. Now any discerning driver would probably notice something sticking up 4 or 5 inches and avoid it but who knows. Lot's to be speculated about this one...

 

[SMAlset]

Not as slim as you might think and as I said we have heard manhole covers flipping up and slamming down while in traffic. It happens, easily found a number of news reports on it. In this report from Greensboro, the woman’s car was a total loss because of the damage done.

City Not Responsible After Manhole Cover Flips Up and Destroys Driver's Car In Greensboro | wfmynews2.com

There’s a video of the story in the article. Basically the city said because the manhole cover hadn’t been reported for repair, they can’t pay out on her claim. This is true from our experience but we were on a winning end—not from a manhole cover but deep potholes that were causing multiple flat tire/wheel rim damage to cars. A shop keeper told us that a number of cars that day had been damaged and she knew it had been reported. We hit the potholes along with 3 other cars that night in the rain (potholes were filled with water) and we lost two tires and a rim. Having this knowledge, we got the City to acknowledge the 911 calls earlier on this so eventually they paid out. They tried to get out of it by saying they couldn't repair it during the rain and we countered with they should have alerted drivers to the hazard by at least putting out cones or those sawhorse barriers to divert drivers from entering that area. Won our claim against the City less depreciation. Didn’t have to go through our insurance and pay out a deductible either.

So as the news reporter and the city official indicated, if you see a road hazard, call it in to police (calls will be recorded). It might save someone else a costly repair, new car or insurance claim.

A few more stories:
7 On Your Side helps NJ couple after manhole mishap

FOX 5 EXCLUSIVE: Drivers say unpaved manhole on DC street damaged their vehicles, caused fire

Cover missing in this case:
Get McGinty: Manhole left open causes car damage, state denies responsibility | wcnc.com

 

[vickh]

Glad you saw humor. Typo corrected so as not to cause too much laughter and give people a heart attack.

But on another note re:Nio any car could have run over the manhole cover and sustained undercarriage damage. I think most EVs especially will have lower ground clearance for aerodynamics and better range and be more susceptible to road debris etc. Hadn’t really thought about manhole covers but over the years we’ve driven over them and sometimes heard them apparently lift up because we heard them slam down in place.

hmm be careful b/c those deaths will be blamed on the 3 too

Depending on how fast the car was driving surprised it happened in a parking garage. I can see the cover flipping at high speeds. Then again I only speed on highways so...

 

[vickh]

CHINA just wants NIO to outperform TESLA... get ready for lots of propaganda reports.

according to a recent Bloomberg cover story Elon is well liked by CCP

 

[SMAlset]

I don’t think it has to be a car driven at high speed. Just the weight of the car hitting it at a spot that would flip/tip it upwards as you drove forward. One of the articles I glanced at this morning, not sure which one, had a link that was a Chinese report on it and had videos and photos. Didn’t click on the videos but one photo was of the underground garage entrance taken from out in the street. This photo was different from the ones in the NYPost article linked above BTW. It looked to me like the sidewalk and maybe part of the street was torn up. Lots of broken concrete pieces across the whole width of the entrance. Didn’t notice a manhole cover in the photo. Maybe happened there or beyond going into the garage’s ramp heading downward. That view wasn’t visible but had workers cordoning off the entrance to the garage.

Found the article, from Business Insider, photos and video in a link to Xinmin Evening News: A Tesla Model 3 caught fire in Shanghai after its battery was damaged, Chinese media report

 

[KenC]

I don’t think it has to be a car driven at high speed. Just the weight of the car hitting it at a spot that would flip/tip it upwards as you drove forward. One of the articles I glanced at this morning, not sure which one, had a link that was a Chinese report on it and had videos and photos. Didn’t click on the videos but one photo was of the underground garage entrance taken from out in the street. This photo was different from the ones in the NYPost article linked above BTW. It looked to me like the sidewalk and maybe part of the street was torn up. Lots of broken concrete pieces across the whole width of the entrance. Didn’t notice a manhole cover in the photo. Maybe happened there or beyond going into the garage’s ramp heading downward. That view wasn’t visible but had workers cordoning off the entrance to the garage.

Found the article, from Business Insider, photos and video in a link to Xinmin Evening News: A Tesla Model 3 caught fire in Shanghai after its battery was damaged, Chinese media report

Not sure if you mean this image. If so, that's just irregular stone pavers.

 

[stopcrazypp]

Explodes? Sounds more like a nasty car fire. Still not good, but reminds me of breathless reporting of a small plane crash landing in a field.

Yeah, I've seen so many EV fires reported as "explosion" but yet there is no evidence an explosion occurred.

 

[SMAlset]

If you watched or read about the fatal MX crash in Mt. View, CA with the attenuator barrier that was in a collapsed state at time of accident, the batteries did explode from the thermal heat runaway and caused quite a lot of noise so I’m sure this situation was like that. I’d describe the batteries as exploding because that’s what they did. I wouldn’t say the car exploded exactly but the batteries did and the car went up in flames. End result pretty much the same to most people.

 

[SMAlset]

Not sure if you mean this image. If so, that's just irregular stone pavers.

Yep that’s the image. Gave you a funny on that. Along those lines guess you can say the fire inside the garage redecorated the ceiling in black.

 

[Dolemite]

Guys. It's China. People get eaten by escalators on a daily basis.

 

[KenC]

Yep that’s the image. Gave you a funny on that. Along those lines guess you can say the fire inside the garage redecorated the ceiling in black.

I used to live in Shanghai, so things we take for normal isn't necessarily normal there. Private-ownership of cars are still a relatively recent phenomenon going back only a generation. I kind of miss all the bikes, and not having so much vehicle traffic.