Tesla Model S Catches Fire at Supercharger Station in Norway

[nationalize the fed]

Car and Driver 4 Jan 2015

A Tesla burned to the ground while it was parked charging at one of the company’s Supercharger fast-charge stations in Norway.


That is foam sprayed by the firefighters, not snow

Norwegian TV station NRK reported the 2014 Model S caught fire on New Year’s Day in Brokelandsheia, a town near the southern coast about 130 miles from Oslo. No one was hurt. Tesla and local firefighters had no explanation for the fire, which had to be extinguished with foam due to flames consuming the lithium-ion battery. Photos show only the wheels, underbody, B-pillars, seat frames, and a few other pieces remaining. The owner was not identified...
Read More: http://blog.caranddriver.com/tesla-model-s-catches-fire-at-supercharger-station-in-norway/





Tesla Model S Burns To A Crisp During Supercharging In Norway: Reports
http://jalopnik.com/tesla-model-s-burns-to-a-crisp-during-supercharging-in-1750581400

More pictures: Tesla tok fyr på Brokelandsheia
http://www.igjerstad.no/tesla-tok-fyr-pa-brokelandsheia

TMC: A Model S just caught fire while supercharging in Norway (link in Norwegian)
http://www.teslamotorsclub.com/showthread.php/59806-A-Model-S-just-caught-fire-while-supercharging-in-Norway-(link-in-Norwegian)

https://twitter.com/NRKno/status/682958259922272256

Some Tesla Fan sites are pretending this didn't happen. So much for Safety First!

TMC Member S4WRXTTCS: What I find fascinating is how various Tesla related User Groups are handling it. The local Northwest Tesla Owners Facebook group seems to have opted to delete all posts related to it. Apparently they're of the belief that hiding it under the bed somehow does anyone any good.
http://www.teslamotorsclub.com/showthread.php/59806-A-Model-S-just-caught-fire-while-supercharging-in-Norway-(link-in-Norwegian)?&p=1304778&viewfull=1#post1304778

Better hope you can get out FAST if you happen to be in a car when a lithium fire breaks out.


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Related- A Tesla Nightmare: 15+ car long queue at Tesla's Tejon CA Supercharger on December 26, 2015

You have been driving for 10 hours straight and there's only 2 hours to go before you get home. You need one last 45 minute charge. Your kids can't stop fighting and your wife isn't feeling well. You finally get to the only super charger for miles around and you realize that it will be 3 hours before you can even plug in for your 45 minute charge:


Tesla model S cars waiting in line for a spot at the Tejon Ranch, CA Supercharger, December 26, 2015

11+ car wait at Tejon Ranch AVOID IF YOU CAN!
http://www.teslamotorsclub.com/showthread.php/59542-(Reported-on-12-26-2015)-11-car-wait-at-Tejon-Ranch-AVOID-IF-YOU-CAN!

A 3 hour wait just to get to the plug. Maybe Toyota and Honda know something about Electric Cars after all.

[whatthehey]

1. And they still catch fire at less than 1/3 the rate of ICE cars

Auto fires kill an average of 4 per week in the US. With about 300K EVs on our roads ( I believe a tad over 1 million worldwide), that number is to my knowledge 0

[OKIsItJustMe]

2. Meaningful comparisons

How many conventional automobiles are there on the US roads? Let’s call it 250 million (i.e. roughly 1,000 times as many as EV’s.)

4 deaths per week, let’s call it 250/year. (It makes the math easy.)

250 deaths/250,000,000 automobiles, gives us 1/1,000,000 deaths/automobile/year.

You say that there are roughly 300,000 EV’s. Assuming a similar death rate, we would expect 0.3 deaths/year.

So, saying that there have been 0 deaths due to EV fires doesn’t really say very much about their relative safety. It doesn’t say that they’re safer. It doesn’t say that they’re more dangerous.

I suspect they’re safer if we’re looking at fires.


In 2013, there were 32,719 motor vehicle deaths in the United States. (i.e. many more than were killed in automobile fires.)

The Tesla Model S rates 5✯’s according to NHTSA. But are EV’s just safer than other vehicles?

The Nissan LEAF rated 4✯’s.

http://www.plugincars.com/safety-ratings-electric-cars-129289.html

[font face=Serif][font size=5]Safety Ratings for Electric Cars[/font]

By Jim Motavalli · January 23, 2014

…

[font size=4]Electric Cars = Small Cars[/font]

[font size=3]Let’s face it, many of today's battery cars—such as the Chevy Spark EV, Honda Fit, Fiat 500e, Scion iQ, Smart ED and more—are either small or smaller than small. So anything that calls into question small car safety could worry EV shoppers.

…

[font size=4]No Greater Risks[/font]

[font size=3]At the Detroit Auto Show, David Friedman, NHTSA deputy administrator, was asked by Bloomberg about electric car safety. “We believe they don’t pose any greater risks than gasoline-fueled vehicles,” he said. In response to his agency’s ongoing investigation of the Tesla fires, he said, “People aren’t used to the new challenges that electric vehicles pose. We’re taking this issue seriously. We want to make sure electric vehicles are safe.”

Safety ratings are ongoing, and many cars aren’t currently rated by one or the other agency. Here’s a ratings survey from NHTSA and IIHS, with the proviso that many of the IIHS ratings are for all versions of the model.

…[/font][/font]

OK, so… perhaps it’s a little soon to say that EV’s are dramatically safer.

[whatthehey]

3. No it's not. That's why I used RATE which is by definition comparable.

Not carrying a couple hundredweight of explosive fuel tends to reduce fires intuitively enough, as data show.

[OKIsItJustMe]

4. Intuition is not data

Intuition may lead you to believe that lithium ion cells don’t catch fire at all. Data tells us otherwise. This was not the first Tesla to catch fire. I predict it won’t be the last.

http://www.businessinsider.com/february-1st-toronto-tesla-fire-2014-2

[font face=Serif][font size=5]Another Tesla Caught On Fire While Sitting In A Toronto Garage This Month[/font]

Feb. 13, 2014, 6:11 PM

[font size=3]Earlier this month, a Tesla Model S sitting in a Toronto garage ignited and caught on fire. The car was about four months old and was not plugged in to an electric socket, says a source.

Fires are a touchy issue for the company, which reports Q4 2013 earnings on February 19th.

Last year, three vehicles caught fire over the course of six weeks. The company has previously pointed out in a government filing that the lithium ion battery cells "have been observed to catch fire or vent smoke and flame." So the fires have raised concerns with consumers and caused a flurry in the media — so much so that CEO Elon Musk has addressed the coverage of these fires himself.

This latest fire occurred after the owner came home from a drive and left the car parked in the garage. After a few moments, the owner's fire detector went off and the fire department was called. Though the fire was intense, the firemen were able to put it out quickly. They also had to remove the other car in the garage, a Lexus, which was parked next to the Tesla.

…[/font][/font]

Right now, they appear to burn less frequently than other cars. However, one advantage they clearly have is that most are relatively new. As they age, we might expect short circuits to become more common, which might lead to more fires.

However, as I pointed out death by fire represents a minority of automobile deaths. If EV’s are inherently safer in crashes for some other reason, then that may be quite significant.

Not carrying a couple hundredweight of explosive fuel tends to reduce fires intuitively enough, as data show.

Despite the impression that you would get from TV and movies, gasoline tank explosions really aren’t that common.

[whatthehey]

5. Did you provide any data? Anecdotes is all I see. Let me...

http://www.nfpa.org/~/media/Files/Research/Fact%20sheets/FireLossFacts.pdf

About one in every thousand cars on the road is an EV. Why aren't there 168 reports of EV fires in 2014 for you to post needlless fearmongering about?

[OKIsItJustMe]

6. I’m not posting fear mongering. As I said, I suspect EV’s are safer when it comes to fires.

According to Elon Musk:

…

The nationwide driving statistics make this very clear: there are 150,000 car fires per year according to the National Fire Protection Association, and Americans drive about 3 trillion miles per year according to the Department of Transportation. That equates to 1 vehicle fire for every 20 million miles driven, compared to 1 fire in over 100 million miles for Tesla. This means you are 5 times more likely to experience a fire in a conventional gasoline car than a Tesla!

…

That is a meaningful comparison, but, upon examination, not a very sound one.


http://www.technologyreview.com/view/521916/update-early-data-suggests-collision-caused-fires-are-more-frequent-in-the-tesla-model-s/

[font face=Serif]Kevin Bullis
November 21, 2013

[font size=5]UPDATE: Early Data Suggests Collision-Caused Fires are More Frequent in the Tesla Model S than Conventional Cars[/font]

[font size=4]When you look at collision data, the Model S looks worse than conventional cars. But it may be too early to draw conclusions.[/font]

|See updates below, including commentary from Tesla CEO Elon Musk.|

[font size=3]Since October, three Tesla Model S electric vehicles have caught fire after they ran into something—first a chunk of metal, then a concrete wall, and then a trailer hitch. Now the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is investigating whether two of the fires (the third happened out of its jurisdiction in Mexico) are the result of a safety defect. No one has been hurt in the fires.

…

Tesla has been comparing the rate its Model S catches fire (1 in 6,333 so far) with the rate with which cars in general catch fire (1 in 1,350 per year). But these figures are really comparing apples to oranges. Only four percent of vehicle fires are caused by collisions—the rest are largely the result of mechanical and electrical failures, which isn’t surprising when you remember that a large fraction of the cars on the road are old and wearing out.

When you look at the number of fires in collisions, (the numbers come from here and here) it comes to one in 32,603 registered vehicles. That’s far less frequent than one fire per 6,333 Model S’s.

That said, we’re only talking about three car fires—that could still be in the realm of bad luck. Based on the limited data, Musk probably isn’t justified in making a strong claim that the Model S is less likely to catch fire. It’s also probably too early to make the reverse claim—that the Model S is more likely to catch on fire–based on the numbers I give above. |UPDATE: It may actually be possible to get statistical significance at these small numbers. But it depends on the assumptions made.|

…[/font][/font]

[NickB79]

7. And I saw a Ford F150 burst into flames for no reason sitting at a Cracker Barrel

Your point?

You think a car with a tank of hydrogen won't occassionally burst into flames as well?