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Owner of Battery Fire Tesla Vehicle: Car 'Performed Very Well, Will Buy Again'
cartechboy writes "The Tesla Model S fire that, to date, is either electric car Armageddon or 'no big deal' has been fun Internet theatre combined with a dose of crowd-sourced battery-pack pseudo-expertise. Now the actual car owner (and Tesla investor) weighs in with his take, which is, basically, 'nothing to see here and yes, I can't wait to get back into a Tesla.' Owner Robert Carlson wrote an email in response to contact by Tesla's vice president of sales and service, Jerome Guillen, saying he found the car had 'performed very well under such an extreme test. The batteries went through a controlled burn which the Internet images really exaggerates.' Carlson had no comment on the guy who videoed his car fire, who is now Internet infamous for shooting video in portrait mode." You can read Elon Musk's take, along with Carlson's correspondence.
My neighbor's truck caught fire shortly after he parked it. Problem was a fuel pump which did not shut down properly, and continued to pump fuel to a hot engine with a leak on the fuel injector rail.
Things went from bad to worse very fast.
He was able to push the thing into the middle of the street while it was in the infancy of the burn stage.
During the height of the burn, all of the neighbors were out with their garden hoses trying to keep the gasoline down, but kinda useless... the tank overheated, ruptured, and sent a small stream of ignited gasoline down the street. Of course, everybody moved their cars pronto. The gasoline went on into the gutter and went underground - what happened to it down there is anyone's guess, but it was well lit and smoked a lot down there.
Point I am trying to make is that when the energy which was intended to move a car and its passengers hundreds of miles is released in the space of a few minutes, the results can be spectacular, and destructive.
The fact the car did not literally explode says a heck of a lot.