You’re undoubtedly aware of the auto transport ship, Felicity Ace, burning and adrift in the Atlantic. The WSJ states that salvage crews are reporting that the reason the ship continues to burn 5 days later is because lithium-ion batteries in the EVs on board the ship have caught fire (or started the fire).

quote:

Captain Joao Mendes Cabeças of the port of Hortas told Reuters that special equipment is needed to extinguish the blaze as lithium-ion car batteries in electric cars on board have caught fire. It is unclear whether the batteries caused the fire or if they were lit ablaze after something else caught fire, Cabeças said…

“The ship is burning from one end to the other… everything is on fire about five meters above the water line,” said Cabeças.

I can’t link the WSJ story because I’m not a subscriber. Car & Driver Magazine is making reference to the Journal story.

Well, insurance policies for transporting EVs are being reevaluated throughout the shipping industry as we speak.

quote:

the ship continues to burn 5 days later is because lithium-ion batteries in the EVs on board the ship have caught fire

[url=https://sfist.com/2021/06/22/as-tesla-fires-require-outlandish-volumes-of-water-to-extinguish-firefighters-grapple-with-ev-batteries/]***LINK***[/url

As a retired FF I was curious as to the involvement of car EV batteries in a car fire. Very illuminating article. We almost always could extinguish a normal car fire with less than 500 gal of water.


Snip from a longer article:

All types of electric vehicles pose problems for firefighters when they crash and their lithium ion batteries go ablaze, but Teslas have routinely required more than 20,000 gallons of water. That does not bode well for wildfire season!

Above we see the very first ever reported electric vehicle battery fire, an image taken in Orange County on August 25, 2017. A Tesla driver (of course) was doing 70 MPH on a Lake Forest, CA residential street, lost control, careened into a garage and hit a BMW parked within. Both vehicles caught fire, as did the house, but firefighters put out most of the blazes within 20 minutes — except the Tesla. The Tesla burned for another three hours, ultimately requiring 20,000 gallons of water to put out.

“But that was 2017!,” a reasonable person would say. “Surely Tesla hardware has improved since.” Not from the looks of it. The infamous mid-April sort-of Autopilot Tesla crash in Texas caused a battery fire that took 28,000 gallons of water to extinguish, the same amount of water that Woodlands Township Fire Department “normally uses in a month,” and “That same volume of water serves an average American home for nearly two years.” Those are the words from the assessment of an NBC News report on the insane difficulties of extinguishing electric vehicle battery fires, whose lithium ion batteries can burn, Energizer Bunny style, for hours and hours.

Wait until a one or more EVs crash in middle of a critical route tunnel.

A lot of Porsche enthusiasts waiting for the arrival of their 2021 purchases must be losing their minds right now.

quote:

Originally posted by Graniteguy:
A lot of Porsche enthusiasts waiting for the arrival of their 2021 purchases must be losing their minds right now.

For sure. Also VWs, Audis, Bentleys on that ship. The ship sailed from Emden, port for the VW Group.

Periodic updates, with a bit more depth on the maritime aspects of the situation, are available on the Maritime Executive web page.

It looks like the Li-ion batteries burn pretty good. Once they started burning in the open deck areas inside the Felicity Ace, the fire must have marched through the hold from one end to the other. Unlikely that much will be salvageable there.

1100 Posches
109 Bentleys
28 Lamborghinis
And a bunch of Audi/VW
4000 cars total, or so.

Saw one article that said they're 'finders keepers'
Probably not worth the risk to board a burning ship for a free Porsche.

IIRC, something similar happened in 2019 & some 911 GT3 RS were lost.

quote:

Originally posted by P250UA5:
1100 Posches
109 Bentleys
28 Lamborghinis
And a bunch of Audi/VW
4000 cars total, or so.

Saw one article that said they're 'finders keepers'
Probably not worth the risk to board a burning ship for a free Porsche.

IIRC, something similar happened in 2019 & some 911 GT3 RS were lost.

Tesla plot …

Fire a couple of torpedo's and you have all the water you need to put it out.

that must really suck

on the ocean, adrift, and on fire

not enough water or equipment to put it out

quote:

Originally posted by YooperSigs:
Fire a couple of torpedo's and you have all the water you need to put it out.

Yep! And a great wreck dive in the future for some explorer to waste grant money. Hey, could be worse, could have happened in the ice pack and contribute to the melting ice and the global warming issue. Call me a cynic!

Danger! All that lithium in the tuna now… Or is that a different thread?

quote:

Originally posted by Sailor1911:

quote:

Originally posted by YooperSigs:
Fire a couple of torpedo's and you have all the water you need to put it out.

Yep! And a great wreck dive in the future for some explorer to waste grant money. Hey, could be worse, could have happened in the ice pack and contribute to the melting ice and the global warming issue. Call me a cynic!

I saw this movie, Not many of them made out in the mud bubble . . .

quote:

Originally posted by Graniteguy:
A lot of Porsche enthusiasts waiting for the arrival of their 2021 purchases must be losing their minds right now.

I can attest to that ...

quote:

Originally posted by P250UA5:
Saw one article that said they're 'finders keepers'

More a them dang’d posche pirates!

quote:

Originally posted by P250UA5:
Saw one article that said they're 'finders keepers'
Probably not worth the risk to board a burning ship for a free Porsche.

Sounds like the plot for Vin Diesel's first Netflix movie.

Once it couldn’t be put out & the crew gone, why not start towing it towards a bay or port?

Maybe it was to far out, maybe progressing beyond salvage?

Seems you could cut a quick deal with a maritime salvage operation to get it towards land.

Just an idea, maybe not a great one.