Graham Butcher

One thing in common with all 3 of the sad events you listed above is that nobody ever posted what the final conclusion was, and nobody it seems ever asked for any updates on the stories. I have now posted in each of the threads requesting if the OPs are still active members for an update on each of the incidents so we can all learn from them. With regard to the true situation with regard to EV car fires here in the UK, please follow these links, and you will see that there have been a lot of incidences and that as EV numbers are increasing all the time, the number of such events is growing rapidly. Also depending on where in the UK one lives, will also impact on the chances of you ever seeing and EV on fire, but as already mentioned in an earlier post, the larger cities are where there are more EVs and so it should not be a surprise that the lion share of EV uptake is in London and presumably this is highly likely to be because of the journeys arein the main only going to be short local ones, which again I suspected would be the case as I have always thought the range is not there yet nor the infrastructure to support longer trips, or adoption of EV's in less populated areas. FSM - FoI data reveals extent of electric vehicle battery fires in UK (fsmatters.com) Vehicle Fires – UK Fire Service Resources How safe are electric cars? | What Car? Are electric car fires really that common? | The Car Expert Electric cars ablaze on transporter on M1 | UK News | Sky News Electric vehicle fires on ships & ferries (evfiresafe.com) My electric BMW blew up and destroyed eight shops (thetimes.co.uk) Tesla car spontaneously catches fire, taking 22,000 litres of water to put it out | Evening Standard Norfolk firefighters face electric vehicle blaze dangers | Eastern Daily Press (edp24.co.uk) 7 Battery Electric Cars a Day Catch Fire in China: The Most Involved Brands - Batteries News

Please can you give us all an update on what was the final verdict on this sad event, we all need to be aware of the cause was in order to try to prevent a similar event from happening again to our cars.

So sorry for your loss, but I would appreciate it if you could please post the outcome of this sorry happening, it might help someone else out.

You said that the car off to Essex to be investigated, what was the end result please, I really don't understand why nobody has bothered to follow this up with you. The result might well be of assistance to someone else as well, so please post the outcome.

@tootThe cause of the parked BMWs catching fire, even when the owners stated that they had turned the engines off and the cars had been parked for sometime before the fire started could well be related to the fact all the ECU's on modern cars are still connected to the car's battery and therefore drawing power. Now this is normally not an issue unless the car has been sat for more than a few days because the current being drawn from the battery is only a few Millie amps (mA) but electronics do fail and so that current could become a few amps or even a dead short when 100s of amps would flow and cause cables to melt and further shorts until a fire is likely to the result unless the battery becomes flat in the meantime. Back in the day, cars catching fire when they had been parked was almost none existent as the electrics only really consisted in the main of lighting and ignition circuits, both of which are switched OFF when parked. Then along came clocks, radios, heated rear windows, then electronic ignition, fuel injection and Engine Control Modules, ABS, ATC, Climate Control etc until we got to what we have now where cars have loads of active circuits all the time, like the KESSY systems, Alarms etc. On the other point you made about EV fires in the UK, I'll be presenting some info on that later and the results are really quite surprising, and the data also shows why some think that this is not an issue while others do and this is where statistics come into play as any sane person would expect that the biggest concentration of fires is going to be where there is the greatest number EV's, which is the large Cities, the number of fires is rising rapidly which is what I expected as the cars age, the chances increase. Much in line as you would expect for mechanical issues with ICE vehicles, as they age, problems increase.

That is part of the problem, manufacturers covering up the problem, they will always push the envelope on any bad news to see what they can get away with, and will generally only respond in a positive fashion when they are forced to by massive legal actions.

To be honest, I really don't know the answer to that question. I only posted about them to give a more rounded picture about EVs. I just got a bit sick of seeing people denying the real facts about the risks, and those same people also pretending statistics don't apply. They also leap on any snippets of info hinting at no EVs were even involved in any of the recent ship fires. Truth is there has been a significant increase of these events over the same period that EVs have been shipped across the globe. We have been shipping cars for decades with few incidents, so logic suggests somethings changed, has petrol suddenly become more voliatile, nope. We need to apply critical thinking to what could be the cays. These ships been at sea for a long time when fires broke out. ICE cars cool down rapidly so any fire caused by leaking fluids contacting heat would have started before leaving the port?

Point was that EV cars have been catching fire and until now this has been suppressed, even Teslas have had their issues but the EV industry have been doing their best to keep under cover because they didn't want the bad publicity. Like all manufacturers, make mistakes from time to time and they nearly all deny that the issues are anything to with them, and they wait until there is a class lawsuit against them and they get caught out and made to put things right. Like VW and diesel gate, then it was discovered that they weren't the only ones cheating, Mercedes and BMW too were caught out I think you find and I doubt that they were the only ones. Manufacturers will try and get away with it if they can. A while ago Vauxhall Zafires were catching fire and Vauxhall were denying it as well and that is an ICE car, so it proves that all cars can have issues and catch fire. That Ford link you gave referred to Hybrids and PHEVs that were having the fire risks.

Oops EV cars catching fire due to faulty battery packs, what, not happening I hear many of you shouting at me, oh dear, well then, what about the Jaguar i-Pace, The Hyundai Kona and the Chevy Volt, all of which are using batteries made by LG Energy Solutions for which LG have agreed to pay GM and Hyundai $2.5Billion and now Land Rover Jaguar are after some money from them as well. Jaguar I-Pace Battery Class Action Lawsuit: LG Chem Batteries Again? (insideevs.com) Jaguar I-Pace Recalled Due To Potential Battery Fire Risk (insideevs.com) NHTSA_Safety_Issues.pdf NHTSA_Safety_Issues.pdf Edit. Update video of the Fremantle Highway, this video makes it clear that it is NOT yet known if EV's started the fire or how many did get caught in the fire, but there does appear to be a bit of a cover-up going on because the ship's owners have not released the manifest for ship's cargo and what was stored on which levels/decks of the ship, all of which will be on record with the owners as the loading had to have been planned for loading purposes to keep the ship stable etc. For the definitive answer, we will have to wait.

I wasn't aware of that fire because the media was preoccupied with other things, it seems currently that so much news that should be reported isn't 🙄. But that does illustrate the inherent dangers with electric vehicles judging by the report of a witness who said it sounded like a jet which does tend to imply that the batteries had entered the thermal runaway stage and were venting flames out sideways with a roar as has been captured on CCTV at EV charging points. It is these jets of flame that are the danger as it quickly spreads the fire to adjacent vehicles etc. In normal fires, the flames go upwards, and adjacent vehicles can often be moved out of the way before they sustain too much damage from the radiated heat.

Yes, those buses that catch fire tend to be those with engines mounted at the rear or slung beneath the floor in a horizontal plain. I can't remember ever when there was a front-engined bus that caught fire. That I suspect is because the driver is right there and detect if there is anything happening with the engine and can stop and shut if off much quicker. With rear and underfloor engines, there are so far away from the driver that it is impossible for them to know if anything is wrong until it stops powering the bus or fire breaks out and someone alerts the driver. As a person who did his apprenticeship with the National Bus Company I can hazard a guess why they catch fire as we had a few catch fire, not those in my care (which the largest garage/depot in the county but many did catch fire in smaller depots where I can assume from I saw of the overall level of maintenance which was IMV poor. The reason tends to be very poor air flow around the engines, diesel and oil leaks, and there are many areas where that can build up a small puddle over time and there is also a lot of dirt and dust etc that settles in these areas and is trapped by the moisture and this effectively becomes and thermal insulator to prevent the engine losing heat though its block etc so the oil/dust mixture heats up of the course of a hard days work and the large alternator tends to mounted close by these areas, and it just needs a few sparks from loose terminals etc and the oil/duct mixture slowly ignites and it grows until it is too late and engulfs the bus. On the buses under my watch at my depot, I used to drive them to bus wash area and remove the floor access panels inside the bus and the rear engined ones, I'd take off the side covers as well raising the rear access hatch and then I'd give them a good wash down with a pressure washer to endure that the build up never happened and that engines lost their furry insulation layers.

For the record, neither did any of my 38 lithium powered devices that my family and I have, such as many phones, many tablets, power drills, torches, video cameras, portable games consoles, digital cameras and also pieces of electronic test equipment. They all have electronic BMS's built in them to prevent batteries getting overcharged, overheating etc., but like all things electronic, they can and do develop faults and nothing lasts forever in the electronic field.

Back on point again, I don't think anybody has actually stated that EVs spontaneously caught fire anymore than ICE vehicles do but when they do, If the battery is involved then it becomes much more complicated to deal with. If the battery does not become a part of the fire, then it is almost like any other car fire, starve it of oxygen, fire goes out, except there is the risk with high voltages.

Hopefully nobody doing that 🔥

Burning gas is not good either, check out the PM figures in the vicinity of boiler or cooker, far worse than standing by a main road.

That has always been my belief that by far the worst offenders are the commercial vehicles. It makes sense as they haul heavy loads, are the least aerodynamic and tend to be in use the whole working day. Cars on the otherhand mainly do relatively short runs twice a day and are then parked up for long periods.

Last post on this with you, just go back, re-read what I wrote and watch those 2 videos I posted and actually pay close attention to what he says, and you should then hopefully understand that neither he nor I are saying anything conclusive other than that car in the photo is a Porsche Taycan, if you cannot decipher what the car is or was from the photo of the shell and the photo of the car side by side then that is your problem, not mine. I also said that assuming the photo was not a fake, but the only other car ship that could have photographed on, which had a fire was the Felicity Ace, and that has sunk, so its highly unlikely that it was that ship. YES we will have to wait for the official report to be published, and I respectfully suggest that you do the same thing instead of leaping the EV defence every time as if I said the was started by an EV which is not what I said, just go back and check and be honest with yourself.

I know, the point I was making is that we have come a long way from the poorly designed and heavily polluting cars we used to drive, and they are still getting better. I did say I that I would hate to know how much pollution those early cars were producing

@wyx087Look, if you are not even going to consider anything said about EV's that does not agree with your viewpoint then I'm done with this discussion with you, its already dragged Colin into this and I'm sure there are other members getting a bit fed up with the tooing and froing, lets agree to disagree, thats it I'm all done, over and out.

So are you now saying that you never said this wyx087 Members 1.6k Location: N London Model: Tesla Model Y LR EV; Nissan Leaf 24kWh EV Posted 14 hours ago https://cleantechnica.com/2023/08/17/a-ship-carrying-electric-cars-is-on-fire-we-must-run-and-tell-the-king/ So the uncontrollable fire on the ship had nothing to do with EV's. Quote All I'm doing is correcting the misinformation you were posting about it. As mentioned in the videos, unless that photo is a fake, that photo proves that your statement was incorrect, the car shown is a Porsche Taycan, a 100% EV car. If you watched and listened to the videos and also read what I wrote, there is claim anywhere that EV car was the cause, that is yet to be determined, but it is an undeniable fact that EV cars were involved in the fire, they were not all on another level of that ship and 100% untouched by the fire, which is what you are implying. This is what you claimed that you were doing to my posts, but nowhere did I ever say that the fire started by an EV, I just said the involvement of EV in the fire made putting the fire out impossible, don't me that you still don't think that they were involved.😣

I'd like to think that your right, maybe the powers to be will come to their senses and see that it looks like a bad move. I'm not anti EV but I cannot see that will solve the climate crisis, its IMV just moving the pollution away from the tail pipe and concentrating it elsewhere.

To give some ideas of the great strides modern ICE engines have made over the years, my first ever car when I passed my driving test was a 1957 Hillman Minx of just 1390cc with a top speed of 77mph, a 0-60miles time of 25.4 secs, power output of 47HP and did just 26mpg, and I'd hate to think about the amount of pollution it and cars of the era were spewing from their tailpipes. Today I have a 2017 Skoda Superb, 1968cc top speed of 137mph and giving out 150HP, 0-62mph of 8.9 secs and gives up to 71mpg with a Euro 6 engine and all the time engines are getting more efficient and Euro 7 engines are now coming out, pushing the economy up even further and pollution levels down even lower with increased HP and torque outputs. Air quality has been vastly improved and there are exciting new developments being introduced all the time. If we stopped destroying vast amounts of forests and actually planted more trees and plants and stopped tarmacing or concreting every bit of green spaces, left proper grass verges at roadsides etc along with the reduction of tailpipe emissions with modern cars, stopped making and selling cars with engines huge great engines (don't forget we have a national speed limit) we will go a long way to reverse the climate change surely?

Excellent, a sane and savvy person who can see both sides of things and not get excited, well done. I do think that EVs have place and might well be the perfect answer for the future but have a long way to go yet. However I do not think that new ICE cars cannot can longer be sold from 2030 onwards is a good move. A better move might have been to put a ban on ICE cars over 2.5litres. Anyone wanting a performance car would need to look at EVs and the biggest polluters would be drastically reduced.

Did you actually watch both videos right through?

Exactly, claiming that EVs started it or not are NOT actually helping their cause, but unless that photos was faked, they were in involved. The world's fire brigades as I posted before can see that there is a real problem which is not going to get any better, only get worse, as more and more EVs take to the road to the point where they are not the minority any more but become the majority and if nothing is done to improve their safety that a real massive problem is just waiting to happen.