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Now imagine a parking garage full of EVs, where one catches fire.

Battery fires are notoriously difficult to extinguish.



This has literally has nothing to do with batteries.


Are you saying ICE cars aren't at risk of incidental fire from other [burning] cars, what with their 10+ gallon gasoline tanks?


Are you saying ICE cars aren't at risk of incidental fire from other [burning] cars, what with their 10+ gallon gasoline tanks?

They definitely are (source: former firefighter here), but a deck full of Teslas's is more of a problem for the FD in some regards, than a corresponding deck full of ICE cars. The reason being, Teslas are known to be hard to extinguish when they burn, and are apparently prone to rekindles. I don't remember the exact number, but I seem to recall hearing that Tesla recommend flowing water on a burning Tesla for somewhere around 10 hours in order to cool it sufficiently to avoid a rekindle.

An average car fire (depending on certain details) can be taken care of in somewhere around an hour, from start to finish. So a bunch of Teslas on fire would require more resources committed for more time, which would possibly impinge on the ability of the FD to handle other calls.

Edit: here's the Tesla Emergency Response Guide[1].

According to the "Firefighting" section:

Battery fires can take up to 24 hours to extinguish. Consider allowing the battery to burn while protecting exposures.

[1]: https://www.tesla.com/sites/default/files/downloads/2016_Mod...


Gasoline and diesel (which is harder to ignite) need a source of ignition to start burning, whereas a lithium ion battery can supply its own. The latter being a solid also means heat can build up deep inside a damaged battery pack enough to cause reignition.


I see I’m not the only one who jumped straight to “lithium fire” upon reading the headline.




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