30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire

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Mon 19 Apr 2021 00:23
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - brum

www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2021/04/18/two-die-.../

www.theverge.com/2021/4/18/22390612/two-people-kil...r

Strange accident, no driver to be found but 2 passengers, both killed when the Tesla hit a tree at high speed and burst into flames. Took 4 hours and 30,000 gallons of water for firecrew to extinguish the resulting inferno. Pictures show horrific aftermath, I doubt there will be anything left of any black box recording to download driving data, so we may never know what was going on.

Raises many questions regarding Teslas "autopilot" and autonomous cars in general AND lithium batteries in cars.

Edited by brum on 19/04/2021 at 00:27

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Mon 19 Apr 2021 08:02
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - mcb100

It raises questions as to why the fire service didn't have the knowledge/equipment to deal with it.

It doesn't raise any questions re autonomous driving as Tesla isn't autonomous, but stupid people are treating it like it is.

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Mon 19 Apr 2021 10:33
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - Bolt

It raises questions as to why the fire service didn't have the knowledge/equipment to deal with it.

It doesn't raise any questions re autonomous driving as Tesla isn't autonomous, but stupid people are treating it like it is.

I think they will have to look at the batteries and casings to see what could have been done to seal batteries against a crash, though I gather they are tested to see how much damage they can take before a burnout occurs, maybe just a one off compared to the amount of cars they make

iirc the batteries burn around 1000 degrees so wont be easy to put out

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Mon 19 Apr 2021 11:09
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - galileo

It raises questions as to why the fire service didn't have the knowledge/equipment to deal with it.

It doesn't raise any questions re autonomous driving as Tesla isn't autonomous, but stupid people are treating it like it is.

I think they will have to look at the batteries and casings to see what could have been done to seal batteries against a crash, though I gather they are tested to see how much damage they can take before a burnout occurs, maybe just a one off compared to the amount of cars they make

iirc the batteries burn around 1000 degrees so wont be easy to put out

Burning lithium probably behaves like magnesium (as used in WW2 incendiary bombs) and water is not very effective in putting them out.

Dry sand was recommended for magnesi.um fires. CO2 is also no use as these burning metals decompose the CO2 to oxygen and soot.

Our learned friend Edlithgow will know more about the chemistry involved?

Edited by galileo on 19/04/2021 at 11:12

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Mon 19 Apr 2021 11:17
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - Steveieb

A friend need to call the brigade when the batteries in his garden machinery kit caught fire in the garage.

apparently susceptible to knocks .

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Mon 19 Apr 2021 11:29
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - John F

It raises questions as to why the fire service didn't have the knowledge/equipment to deal with it.

Tesla's advice is not to attempt to put out a fire, just let it burn out. So presumably they just needed to damp down the surrounding area so it didn't spread. Surely the local fire chief should know that, seeing there are so many potentially inflammable EVs in that neck of the woods. The occupants must have been cremated long before they arrived, so no chance of rescue.

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Mon 19 Apr 2021 12:04
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - Andrew-T

<< Burning lithium probably behaves like magnesium (as used in WW2 incendiary bombs) and water is not very effective in putting them out. >>

Lithium is an alkali metal and IIRC will react with water like sodium or potassium - i.e. with vigour. Magnesium is not as reactive, but once burning is pretty unstoppable.

The problem that worries me is that if a heavy lump of anything chemically reactive has to stop instantly, that lump will continue travelling forwards, demolishing anything or anyone in front of it. Safety belts are OK for bodies, but restraining a large solid battery will take some doing, adding even more to the mass of the vehicle.

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Mon 19 Apr 2021 12:22
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - pd

I'm not convinced carrying a large tank of very highly flammable liquid about with you plus a large metal lump right in front of your feet is any better/worse solution. Swings and roundabouts I guess.

(OK, so diesel & Porsche 911 drivers are probably ahead on this one!).

Edited by pd on 19/04/2021 at 12:23

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Mon 19 Apr 2021 12:43
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - daveyjp

Despite somehow managing a grade B in Chemistry, one of the very few experiments I remember was throwing lithium into water. It was enough for me to know if I have lots of it spraying with water isn't the thing to do.

However brake fluid on a hot exhaust manifold isn't a good mix either.

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Mon 19 Apr 2021 15:58
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - edlithgow

I'm not convinced carrying a large tank of very highly flammable liquid about with you plus a large metal lump right in front of your feet is any better/worse solution. Swings and roundabouts I guess.

(OK, so diesel & Porsche 911 drivers are probably ahead on this one!).

Ok, I get the diesel point, and I agree that people are suprisingly relaxed about petrol (compared to, say, hydrogen) because they are used to it.

But I don't get the 911 point. Surely a front engine car is safer, because the momentum of the engine will be fairly directly transferred to whatever the hits. With a rear-engine, one would be between a rock and a hard place, or at least a tree trunk and a muckle mass of metal.

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Mon 19 Apr 2021 16:01
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - edlithgow

Not really, I;d have to look it up.

IIRC John Cadogan has fulminated a bit on this characteristic of the batteries, but then the subtext seems to be he doesny like Elon Musk much.

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Mon 19 Apr 2021 13:18
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - Engineer Andy

www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2021/04/18/two-die-.../

www.theverge.com/2021/4/18/22390612/two-people-kil...r

Strange accident, no driver to be found but 2 passengers, both killed when the Tesla hit a tree at high speed and burst into flames. Took 4 hours and 30,000 gallons of water for firecrew to extinguish the resulting inferno. Pictures show horrific aftermath, I doubt there will be anything left of any black box recording to download driving data, so we may never know what was going on.

Raises many questions regarding Teslas "autopilot" and autonomous cars in general AND lithium batteries in cars.

I wonder if the car's bodyshell/other components also contributed to the severity oif the fire - is the bodyshell made of steel or aluminium, given the latter will significantly aid a fire under certain circumstances.

A former colleague of mine owned a Jag which caught fire and burnt itself to ash because of its aluminium and magnesium parts.

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Mon 19 Apr 2021 14:25
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - sammy1

I wonder if the fire brigade even new it was a Tesla. By the time they got there the wreck would have been unrecognisable. Hitting a tree in any car is not good but I to have reservations about the inertia of heavy batteries. Although crash testing would have been done I wonder what long term real time usage will throw up as to their safety verses other cars.

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Mon 19 Apr 2021 14:45
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - Steveieb

Reminds me of Richard Hammonds crash in the Swiss mountains in his Chinese electric super car during an edition of Grand Tour.

He was lucky to jump out before the car imploded and again the advice was to leave well alone until the fire burnt itself out.

Maybe this is one of the reasons that Clarkson and May decided that it was the time to call it a day on the Grand Tour ?

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Mon 19 Apr 2021 16:27
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - Engineer Andy

Maybe they should give The Hamster a new nickname of 'Lucky'...

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Mon 19 Apr 2021 17:00
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - skidpan

Not read the article but lets consider the facts.

It in the USA, Texas actually. Its not the first Tesla incident where the owner thought the car did not need a driver.

In a large state like Texas how far from the nearest fire station did this accident occur, it could have taken ages for the services to arrive.

Has anyone considered how much 30,000 gallons of water weigh, Mr Casio says 134 tons. How many appliances were required to carry that little lot?

No wonder it took 4 hours.

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Mon 19 Apr 2021 18:35
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - Andrew-T

Has anyone considered how much 30,000 gallons of water weigh, Mr Casio says 134 tons. How many appliances were required to carry that little lot?

With luck they may have been able to pump from a nearby stream, but Texas is a fairly dry state. On the other hand dealing with a forest fire may take rather more than 134 tons.

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Mon 19 Apr 2021 16:58
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - Bolt

I wonder if the fire brigade even new it was a Tesla.

at the rate the batteries burn, it is likely they couldn`t see what car it was, like a burning mobile phone, if its burning you cannot see what it is as the fire is so fierce within seconds.

problem testing is they cannot account for every scenario, so there is always one crash that obliterates the car which a test misses.....

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Mon 19 Apr 2021 18:53
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - brum

Nobody seems concerned there was no-one in the drivers seat. Apparently all thats checked in a tesla is a bit of torque on the steering wheel indicating the presence of a hand.

I wonder if the guy in the back seat was filming the tesla driving itself with the front passenger just inputting a bit of steering from time to time to fool it into thinking the driver was present.

Maybe they'll find the phone....

Apparently though black box type data is stored in the vehicle, autopilot data is not, its streamed back to Tesla. Tesla has a history of not releasing such data to the authorities.

www.latimes.com/business/story/2020-02-24/autopilo...y

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Mon 19 Apr 2021 20:43
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - sammy1

Nobody seems concerned there was no-one in the drivers seat. Apparently all thats checked in a tesla is a bit of torque on the steering wheel indicating the presence of a hand

It is possible that the driver got out and left the scene?

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Wed 21 Apr 2021 08:44
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - Engineer Andy

Nobody seems concerned there was no-one in the drivers seat. Apparently all thats checked in a tesla is a bit of torque on the steering wheel indicating the presence of a hand.

I wonder if the guy in the back seat was filming the tesla driving itself with the front passenger just inputting a bit of steering from time to time to fool it into thinking the driver was present.

Maybe they'll find the phone....

Apparently though black box type data is stored in the vehicle, autopilot data is not, its streamed back to Tesla. Tesla has a history of not releasing such data to the authorities.

www.latimes.com/business/story/2020-02-24/autopilo...y

If true, that rather blows Musk's contention that the car wasn't on autopilot.

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Wed 21 Apr 2021 20:44
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - brum

Musk is just playing at semantics.

When it hit the tree it wasn't on Autopilot. I would say the likely scenario is it was another Youtuber, driver jumped across to the passenger side so the rear passenger could do his Youtube video. At some point, the Tesla decided the driver wasn't holding the steering wheel, right or some other check came into play, and it decided to cancel autopilot to hand back control to the driver. Unfortunately the driver was on the passenger side so couldn't operate the brakes to reduce speed or re-engange autopilot.

Driver was in the wrong place at the wrong time, metaphorically speaking

In the past ,Tesla has never released Autopilot data for independent analysis and I expect they will refuse again.

news.sky.com/story/police-to-search-tesla-after-ve...5

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Wed 21 Apr 2021 22:42
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - sammy1

30,000 galls is 124 Us tons of Water so unless there was a convenient lake nearby is quite a few fire engines. What will happen if there is a serious EV fire on our motorways?

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Wed 21 Apr 2021 23:22
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - alan1302

What will happen if there is a serious EV fire on our motorways?

Fire brigade will come and put it out...like any other fire on the motorway :-)

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Thu 22 Apr 2021 10:51
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - brum

What will happen if there is a serious EV fire on our motorways?

Fire brigade will come and put it out...like any other fire on the motorway :-)

Interesting question and answer

From what I read, a Tesla and possibly other EV battery pack will burn for 4 hours or more no matter what you do as it keeps reigniting, and so will not be safe to move for many hours. As EV battery packs are placed low down and close to the road, due to the temperatures reached there is potential for significant damage to the road surface, so even after lifting on a recovery truck, the road may need major repairs. It may involve closing the motorway for a few days and a lot of remedial costs to highways england never mind the emergency services and the public inconvenienced by having to drive many miles extra at 20-30mph through country villages, which in turn will damage their roads.

I wonder if Highways England would persue a claim for hundreds of thousands of pounds against the cars insurer to recover their costs?

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Thu 22 Apr 2021 12:29
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - moward

As opposed to burning fuel which when it leaks actually lies on, and permeates into, the surface of the road. Fuel burns at extremely high temperatures also (adiabatic flame temperature of petrol is >2000c) so not sure why a battery fire should provoke additional concerns. At least it tends to stay put near the vehicle.

Edited by moward on 22/04/2021 at 12:35

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Wed 21 Apr 2021 20:50
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - Xileno

Amazing the tyre didn't burn in the heat generated.

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Wed 21 Apr 2021 22:44
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - bathtub tom

Amazing the tyre didn't burn in the heat generated.

30,000 gallons of water might have had something to do with that.

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Thu 22 Apr 2021 12:24
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - sammy1

""I wonder if Highways England would persue a claim for hundreds of thousands of pounds against the cars insurer to recover their costs?""

Car insurance is already higher for EV cars presumably because of their higher purchase price and the cost of their batteries. IF companies have to cover the cost of road repairs we can look out. The instance of car and HGV fires is very low. The potentially more intense fire of an EVs is more serious. HGVs are going to be powered by both batteries and or Hydrogen so this does not hold good. A lot of the HGV fires start with overheating brakes as well as accidents.

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Sun 25 Apr 2021 07:16
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - Bolt

HGVs are going to be powered by both batteries and or Hydrogen so this does not hold good. A lot of the HGV fires start with overheating brakes as well as accidents.

HGVs will more than likely be powered by Hydrogen but not through diesel engines, they will be EVs, imagine powering an HGV with a trailer full of batteries, point is in an accident the Hydrogen will escape from the tank before a fire could start, making Hydrogen safer than batteries and taking up less space.

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Sun 25 Apr 2021 13:21
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - Engineer Andy

HGVs are going to be powered by both batteries and or Hydrogen so this does not hold good. A lot of the HGV fires start with overheating brakes as well as accidents.

HGVs will more than likely be powered by Hydrogen but not through diesel engines, they will be EVs, imagine powering an HGV with a trailer full of batteries, point is in an accident the Hydrogen will escape from the tank before a fire could start, making Hydrogen safer than batteries and taking up less space.

I certainly wouldn't want to be near one of them in that circumstance! I once saw an HGV (a tanker lorry, I think) driving at 70mph on the M25 with its rear brakes (one side only) locked on.

I can imagine the heat that would generate, let alone the damage that might be done if a catastrophic part failure occurred and bits flew off at high speed (rather like they did with the cause of the Concorde crash).

Petrol and diesel may not be environmentally good, but they pack a huge wallop for the space they take up (compared to batteries and Hydrogen) and have sufficient safety systems to stop most (though not all) accidents turning into disasters (probably why having diesel-fuelled HGVs is far better than petrol ones).

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Sun 25 Apr 2021 06:36
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - bananastand

I know I'm missing something here - I failed chemistry O level - and I know what happens when you throw sodium or potassium into water - but isn't lithium the third lightest element after hydrogen and helium? But it's also a metal....okay

and it's a treatment for serious mental illness

with no antidote for overdose

just telling you what I think I know without checking google first

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Sun 25 Apr 2021 09:37
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - Andrew-T

just telling you what I think I know without checking google first

'Lithium' used to treat bipolar disorder is in fact lithium carbonate, a relative of sodium carbonate (washing soda). It won't be much help in a metallic battery.

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Sun 25 Apr 2021 15:54
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - galileo

I know I'm missing something here - I failed chemistry O level - and I know what happens when you throw sodium or potassium into water - but isn't lithium the third lightest element after hydrogen and helium? But it's also a metal....okay

and it's a treatment for serious mental illness

with no antidote for overdose

just telling you what I think I know without checking google first

Lithium reacts more violently with watre than sodium or potassium, releasing (and usually igniting )hydrogen gas.

Water obviously not good at extinguishing a lithium fire.

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Sun 25 Apr 2021 17:10
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - moward

Sorry but this is incorrect. For the alkali metals group of the periodic table, reactivity increases as you go down the group, hence lithium is the least reactive of the group being the smallest atomic size. Some revision for you all :-)

Chemical properties of the alkali metals - Group 1 - the alkali metals - Edexcel - GCSE Combined Science Revision - Edexcel - BBC Bitesize

I remember the old chemistry experiments from back in my school days. Lithium fizzed about on the surface when dropped into water, potassium burst into flame, and caesium explodes (well it would if we had had any, had to make do with a video).

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Sun 25 Apr 2021 17:42
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - Andrew-T

I remember the old chemistry experiments from back in my school days. Lithium fizzed about on the surface when dropped into water, potassium burst into flame, and caesium explodes (well it would if we had had any, had to make do with a video).

I'm sure my old school never had any lithium - we had to make do with little bits of Na or K.

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Mon 26 Apr 2021 17:44
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - Engineer Andy

Sorry but this is incorrect. For the alkali metals group of the periodic table, reactivity increases as you go down the group, hence lithium is the least reactive of the group being the smallest atomic size. Some revision for you all :-)

Chemical properties of the alkali metals - Group 1 - the alkali metals - Edexcel - GCSE Combined Science Revision - Edexcel - BBC Bitesize

I remember the old chemistry experiments from back in my school days. Lithium fizzed about on the surface when dropped into water, potassium burst into flame, and caesium explodes (well it would if we had had any, had to make do with a video).

Those exploding mobile phones and laptops obviously have something that causes them - the Li-Ion batteries, so they still must be reactive to something - presumably heat. Perhaps CO2 extiguishers would be of more use. Water may cool them down, but the 'fizzing' may well be a lot worse as the concentration of Lithium in battery packs is so much higher, combined with the heat.

Even with our not-so warm climate, I'm still surprised that more EV fires haven't occured, especially in early cars like the Nissan Leaf mk1 which don't have much (if any) proper battery cooling system.

I also wonder if other metals in the cars have an effect after accidents as I mentioned above (aluminium or magnesium), especially when high temperatures are involved, inclduing accidents in very hot/sunny weather.

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Mon 26 Apr 2021 18:52
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - Bolt

Those exploding mobile phones and laptops obviously have something that causes them

Yes the report said that the battery/batteries did not have room to expand and the heat dissipation wasn`t good enough which has been cured, it wasn`t what was in them as much as no room to expand

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Sun 25 Apr 2021 20:15
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - Brit_in_Germany

There is no lithium metal in the rechargeable batteries though, the key word being "ion".

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Sun 25 Apr 2021 22:00
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - Galaxy

The most effective fire extinguisher for an EV fire would probably be liquid nitrogen.

It's very low temperature would take the heat out of the fire and the nitrogen released would prevent oxygen from reaching the flames. Both of these actions would help to put the fire out.

It's used for fire fighting on submarines, apparently.

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Sun 25 Apr 2021 23:15
30,000 gallons of Water to put out Tesla S Fire - Andrew-T

There is no lithium metal in the rechargeable batteries though, the key word being "ion".

Just as there is no lead in traditional accumulator batteries ?

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