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Massive EV cement truck fire: official 'explanation' versus the facts.
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EPAIII:
You say my example was not a good one because it was so small that it would not have even been part of the statistics. You are correct. I did not report it to anyone except my wife and employer because I might have been late for work on the following Monday. And I doubt that the shop which did the repairs reported it to anyone; at least not to my knowledge.

Actually THAT very fact shows just how pertinent my example was. The gasoline/oil fire  in my truck was so slow to grow that I DID have time to take effective action. And I only needed a very SMALL, probably the smallest available, fire extinguisher to put it out.

Apparently the driver of the EV did find a fire extinguisher and use it. If I am not mistaken you can see one or perhaps even two fire extinguishers in the videos and they are nice, BIG ones. Far bigger than the one I used. It or they did NOTHING to stop the battery fire. And he/she apparently did not have time to return with a better one.

Frankly I doubt that once the fire had progressed from that original cell to one or two of it's neighbors, that any firefighting equipment could have stopped it. What time frame was that? Two or three minutes? Perhaps just seconds? Certainly not very long. Just how much protective material do they place between the cells in these EV batteries? Probably not much.

I think this is a magnificent comparison between a fire in a gas/diesel vehicle and in a EV. Both started as a small, confined fire. One stayed local/confined while the other spread quickly. One fire did not even make the statistics while the other brought down a whole building. One bad cell in an EV battery destroyed over 1000 vehicles and the building they were parked in.

Thanks for helping me with that point. It is a great point.




--- Quote from: vk6zgo on December 22, 2023, 01:13:51 pm ---
--- Quote from: thm_w on December 22, 2023, 01:05:00 am ---
--- Quote from: EPAIII on December 21, 2023, 03:18:34 am ---That statistic may be true, but it sounds like it needs to be clarified.

One thing I would ask about is just how big the fire events were. Perhaps I am wrong, but when a gas or diesel vehicle catches fire, it can be easily extinguished. I had a fire in my gas powered truck on a highway trip and was able to put it out with the small fire extinguisher that I carried. I even had time to pull over to the shoulder of the road, get out of the truck, open the hood, observe the fire, go into the trailer to get the extinguisher, return to the truck, and put the fire out. I did this myself, with a small extinguisher. And after it cooled down, I was able to drive the truck and trailer to the next exit where repairs were made.
--- End quote ---

You are giving an example which wouldn't even have been in the gas vehicle fire statistics, not the greatest example but OK.
Your concerns should be resolved by having the appropriate tools for the fire department, sprinklers or other systems inside car parks to mitigate fire spread where possible. As mentioned above, as LFP gets wider adoption, spread will be less of an issue if at all.

...<snip>...


--- End quote ---

--- End quote ---
EPAIII:
Well, I have been in busy auto parks and in ones that were almost totally isolated and deserted (the long term ones). And even the busy ones had areas where there was little or no activity. Upper floors or distant corners, etc. And in office buildings the second basement can see almost no one after 8PM and before 7AM. As I said, BEEN THERE and DONE THAT.

The fact that the owner was present and that it was a busy parking building did NOTHING to stop the disaster. You also have actually helped my point. The fire department would need to be there within a minute or two after that first cell caught fire. And even then, they may not have been able to stop it. Thanks for helping to make my point.

As for it being a diesel, I believe the powers-that-be are emphasizing that word instead of saying it was some kind of hybrid which did have a lithium based battery - a big one.




--- Quote from: Gyro on December 22, 2023, 01:56:01 pm ---
--- Quote from: EPAIII on December 22, 2023, 05:49:27 am ---Airport car park! Been there. They are one of the loneliest places in any city. I wonder just how many cars were either on fire or completely burned out BEFORE ANYONE even noticed there was a fire.
...
If a battery fire can destroy 1500 vehicles in an airport car park...

--- End quote ---

This one was spotted almost immediately (while it was just a single car), it's a busy car park. People tried to fight it with available fire extinguishers before being forced to retreat.

As previously detailed, it wasn't an EV, it was a Diesel.

--- End quote ---
johansen:

--- Quote from: Monkeh on December 24, 2023, 03:45:25 am ---
--- Quote from: johansen on December 24, 2023, 03:21:41 am ---https://www.nfpa.org/education-and-research/research/nfpa-research/fire-statistical-reports/vehicle-fires?l=0

Using that data as a baseline, there have neen 302 deaths per year due to small vehicle fires.

https://www.tesla-fire.com/
80 confirmed deaths, 218 fires.

You can run the numbers to adjust for the far, far fewer number of Teslas in existence compared to all other vehicles.

--- End quote ---

Yes, let's compare an average from a single nation with 10 cumulative years globally. The number you're looking for is 6.7, not 80.

--- End quote ---

You can easily see, just on the ratio of 218 fires and 80 deaths.. they are far higher than ICE on a per mile driven measure, and deadlier.

just looking at the list, there have been 31 fires in the last 12 months in the usa, and 30-34 casualties in the usa. that tells me that not all the fires are being reported. just look at the fact that none of the fires in other countries have any casualties, except for germany with a couple.

teslas make up just 4% of the vehicles on the road in the usa..hmm...
Monkeh:

--- Quote from: EPAIII on December 24, 2023, 05:24:24 am ---As for it being a diesel, I believe the powers-that-be are emphasizing that word instead of saying it was some kind of hybrid which did have a lithium based battery - a big one.

--- End quote ---

You can believe what you like, but the vehicle is known to have been a TDV6 model - NOT a hybrid.


--- Quote from: johansen on December 24, 2023, 05:40:19 am ---just looking at the list, there have been 31 fires in the last 12 months in the usa, and 30-34 casualties in the usa. that tells me that not all the fires are being reported.

--- End quote ---

I'm not sure how it tells you that, but okay.

So, where are the other 4600 fires? If they're 4% of vehicles they'd be 4% of fires if the rate was equal, and 4% of the average from your own data source is 4,694.8 fires.
johansen:

--- Quote from: Monkeh on December 24, 2023, 05:52:28 am ---
--- Quote from: EPAIII on December 24, 2023, 05:24:24 am ---As for it being a diesel, I believe the powers-that-be are emphasizing that word instead of saying it was some kind of hybrid which did have a lithium based battery - a big one.

--- End quote ---

You can believe what you like, but the vehicle is known to have been a TDV6 model - NOT a hybrid.


--- Quote from: johansen on December 24, 2023, 05:40:19 am ---just looking at the list, there have been 31 fires in the last 12 months in the usa, and 30-34 casualties in the usa. that tells me that not all the fires are being reported.

--- End quote ---

I'm not sure how it tells you that, but okay.

So, where are the other 4600 fires? If they're 4% of vehicles they'd be 4% of fires if the rate was equal, and 4% of the average from your own data source is 4,694.8 fires.

--- End quote ---

There are about 300 deaths due to fires in the usa. (Like 5 year moving average )
10% of them are from teslas. As per last years data.

Which make up 4% of the cars on the road.

This 2.5:1 ratio fits with the insurance cost data you can also find.

Read more here
https://www.tesladeaths.com/resources
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