4 ms·

Lithium Ion batteries pack a lot of energy it takes less than you think to start a cascade failure.

• greglindahl 13y ago
  Tesla's battery is engineered to prevent cascade failures. That system worked OK in the first fire, and the short duration of the latest fire probably means it worked there, too.
• pkulak 13y ago
  Depends on the chemistry. Notice a lack of any Leaf or Volt fires, despite many more being on the road? Li-manganese and li-phosphate go into thermal runaway at 2.5C and 3.4C respectively (C being the rate at which a battery would be depleted in one hour). The Tesla batteries do it at about 300C. Tesla gets a cheaper and much more energy dense battery in exchange for that risk, but they also have to deal with PR events like this. As an aside, I'd totally drive a Tesla if I could afford it. I'm not trying to say the car is unsafe. They use a riskier chemistry, but they've also gone to extraordinary lengths to manage that risk with really aggressive thermal management, barriers, etc. There have yet to be any injuries.