Possible Lightning Fire

[F150ROD]

Im sure we will hear from the owner soon enough.

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[RickLightning]

It's amazing the amount of meterologists and fire professionals that exist on this one forum...

 

[Skidrowe]

It's amazing the amount of meterologists and fire professionals that exist on this one forum...

I'm just an amateur internet detective with a high opinion of himself. Are meterologists the guys from the water company who constantly misread my water meter?

 

[TaxmanHog]

Tangential story about EV fires, it's speculated to have caused the ship to catch fire recently, it had a cargo of european models.

 

[KevinC]

Ummm.......another reason they should just make them here so they dont have to put them on a cargo ship? There was another cargo ship meeting a similar fate a year ago with id.4s.

 

[MickeyAO]

About 600 cars catch fire every day in the US. The only ones that make national news headlines are EVs.

It's actually an average of 150 ICE fires a day, and an EV anywhere in the world on fire that will make the headlines, but the result is the same. I've seen two ICE vehicle fires within a mile of my lab in the last year with no media in sight, but when we had the fire department respond the other night, all the news media were there!

 

[MickeyAO]

You are correct it generally is more difficult because when you have an EV battery thermal runway, the chemical reaction driving the fire is not dependent on ambient oxygen to burn, so traditional firefighting methods aimed at oxygen starvation are ineffective. However, a sufficiently large amount of water can *cool* the battery enough to stop the thermal runaway, which is it appears to be more difficult to extinguish since it needs more water resources.

The problem is the battery in enclosed and underneath the vehicle, so any amount of water used would be hard pressed to cool the battery pack. This makes me think the battery is not actually in thermal runaway (remember, I send packs into thermal runaway for clients all the time).

Next speculation (based on previous EV fires) would be high resistance at the charge port of one of the vehicles. I know of several EV fires that started this way to include a Tesla at a Supercharger in Norway.

 

[Maquis]

It's actually an average of 150 ICE fires a day, and an EV anywhere in the world on fire that will make the headlines, but the result is the same. I've seen two ICE vehicle fires within a mile of my lab in the last year with no media in sight, but when we had the fire department respond the other night, all the news media were there!

The article I read stated 213,000 per year on average. But that’s all car fires including accidents and arson.

These are the 2018 numbers:

 

[Maxx]

The problem is the battery in enclosed and underneath the vehicle, so any amount of water used would be hard pressed to cool the battery pack. This makes me think the battery is not actually in thermal runaway (remember, I send packs into thermal runaway for clients all the time).

Next speculation (based on previous EV fires) would be high resistance at the charge port of one of the vehicles. I know of several EV fires that started this way to include a Tesla at a Supercharger in Norway.

I think the big question on everyone’s mind is in both cases (thermal runaway and high resistance …), how can it be detected and prevented early before your house burns Down?

Does a bad battery that start a thermal runaway have a higher or lower voltage than the rest (by how much)? What triggers such an event? Charging to 100%? Towing uphill in summer? ……?

In case of high resistance, does that usually happens when there is bad contact and buzzing sound? Does the handle get hot? Is it more likely happen at DCFC because contacts are used more often and there is more power involved? Or with Level 2 charging because of nature of alternating current?

You can tell I am a bit lost here and really not Interested in being prematurely barbecued.

 

[MickeyAO]

The article I read stated 213,000 per year on average. But that’s all car fires including accidents and arson.

These are the 2018 numbers:

My numbers come from NTSHA that I had to quote in a paper about two years ago.

 

[Maxx]

The article I read stated 213,000 per year on average. But that’s all car fires including accidents and arson.

These are the 2018 numbers:

‘I would be curious how age of the vehicle play a part in this. If 90% ICE fires happened in vehicles older than 10 years and BEV batteries become dangerous after 10 years, the relative safety of BEV shown here is misleading since we don’t have that many of old ones out there yet. I am not saying they are not safer. Just saying with limited info you can have stats say any story you want.

 

[MickeyAO]

I think the big question on everyone’s mind is in both cases (thermal runaway and high resistance …), how can it be detected and prevented early before your house burns Down?

Does a bad battery that start a thermal runaway have a higher or lower voltage than the rest (by how much)? What triggers such an event? Charging to 100%? Towing uphill in summer? ……?

In case of high resistance, does that usually happens when there is bad contact and buzzing sound? Does the handle get hot? Is it more likely happen at DCFC because contacts are used more often and there is more power involved? Or with Level 2 charging because of nature of alternating current?

You can tell I am a bit lost here and really not Interested in being prematurely barbecued.

Unfortunately, my lab has not investigated the high resistance at the charge port...but there has been a shake up at the lab and I might suggest it as a topic.

For thermal runaway, there are MANY different standards based on the application. For most of my thermal propagation tests, we send one cell into a thermal runaway (via heater pad of penetration by a nail) and watch the propagation through the pack. For home energy storage, the standard is no external fire visible...I do not wish to name the standard or which manufacturers have actually passed the test.

Vehicles are a different standard and I cannot discuss the results on this forum, but needless to say I have witnessed full thermal propagation through many different BESS (Battery Storage Energy Systems) for a wide variety of applications and can spot thermal propagation versus a standard fire.

Based on the video available, I do not see thermal propagation so it is a standard fire burning available fuel.

Now of course I do not know the timeline of the video, so I do not know if the signs of thermal propagation happened earlier, but the firefighters are standing WAY to close if thermal propagation was happening. Think 6 to 8 foot flame jets.

 

[MickeyAO]

‘I would be curious how age of the vehicle play a part in this. If 90% ICE fires happened in vehicles older than 10 years and BEV batteries become dangerous after 10 years, the relative safety of BEV shown here is misleading since we don’t have that many of old ones out there yet. I am not saying they are not safer. Just saying with limited info you can have stats say any story you want.

We actually did a study on the effects on aged LMO (Volt) cells compared to fresh cells...you should be able to find the paper. We did 'safety' (all the things manufacturers tell you not to do, we do them) testing on fresh cells and then several years later, we took the cycle life and calendar life cells and subjected them to the same overcharge tests. I would suspect the same would apply to LFP and NMC cells. Sorry that I'm not allowed to link to the actual paper in this forum, but look for EssEs (Energy Storage Systems and Evolution of Safety).

 

[Maquis]

My numbers come from NTSHA that I had to quote in a paper about two years ago.

Yeah, I think there are a lot of numbers that get taken out of context (like I did!). I think the one I reference includes every vehicle that burned. Think of a couple years ago when the wildfires in California swept through entire towns - hundreds of cars burned that were no fault of the car.

BTW….Thanks for all of your contributions to the forum. I learn a lot from your posts.

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