[BillyO]

News of a Chevy Volt burning three weeks after crash testing can't be good news for the electric car industry. Fisker investors must be concerned. I would expect more delays and regulation will be down the road.

Billy O

 

[Dutch]

This news is such nonsense. The car was crash-tested (sideways) and then left for three weeks without checking the battery, after which it ignited. Every day in this world dozens of people die because their gas-powered cars catch fire, not after three weeks but immediately after they crash, or just while driving! If in 1900 we had stuck with electric engines and in 2011 someone would have come up with the idea of filling up cars with highly combustable and explosive liquids, that person would have been thrown in jail.

But ofcourse the electric car-haters like Fox will have a field day with this non-news. Fox-people prefer to keep on sponsoring oil countries like Iran, every time they fill up. So that their dollars can be used by Iran to develop a nuclear weapon and deliver missiles to Hezbollah and Hamas, which then get fired at Israel.

It makes you wonder why Fox and people like Romney try to keep the US dependent on oil from the Middle East. I guess that's what happens when you're on the take from the oil industry.

 

[ct-fiskerbuzz]

This news is such nonsense. The car was crash-tested (sideways) and then left for three weeks without checking the battery, after which it ignited. ...

Indeed. That's the virtual equivalent of, say, crash-testing a fuel storage tank, then leaving it full of fuel in the parking lot for three weeks right next to a pile of oily rags.

(People do in fact leave oily rags piled in garages, where spontaneous combustion eventually occurs. People will also do dumb things with cars, whether electric or gasoline. You can make it easier to do the right thing, and harder to do the wrong thing, but you can't make it impossible to do the wrong thing.)

 

[Fabulist]

This news is such nonsense. The car was crash-tested (sideways) and then left for three weeks without checking the battery, after which it ignited.

Also note that NHTSA tried to replicate the event by crash testing another Volt in the same way and letting it sit for 3 weeks with a fully charged battery, and absolutely nothing happened.

By comparison, out of 1500 747s built since the aircraft went into production, 49 were lost to accidents. GM has already sold 15000 Volts and 1 has had an unexplained fire. Does Boeing need to convince people all over the world that the 747 is a safe plane?

-- Fab.

 

[Deep Ocean]

Agree. In time all will look at these reports as nonsense. Note: I don't think that a fire extinguisher will put out that kind of battery fire. More room in my trunk for clubs. : )

 

[BillyO]

This news is such nonsense. The car was crash-tested (sideways) and then left for three weeks without checking the battery, after which it ignited.

Also note that NHTSA tried to replicate the event by crash testing another Volt in the same way and letting it sit for 3 weeks with a fully charged battery, and absolutely nothing happened.

By comparison, out of 1500 747s built since the aircraft went into production, 49 were lost to accidents. GM has already sold 15000 Volts and 1 has had an unexplained fire. Does Boeing need to convince people all over the world that the 747 is a safe plane?

-- Fab.

I agree, the news is nonsense; but there will be some kind of PR fall out.
Are you sure 3 out of every 100, 747s have been lost to accidents? That seems really high.
Billy O

 

[Fabulist]

Are you sure 3 out of every 100, 747s have been lost to accidents? That seems really high.

Here is the list. Foreign crashes, especially cargo flights, generally don't get a great deal of coverage in the US, which is why the number seems on the high side. The most recent accident occurred on July 28, 2011 for example, but got almost no news coverage in the US.

-- Fab.

 

[Fabulist]

And now the inevitable investigation.

-- Fab.

 

[ct-fiskerbuzz]

By the way, I was just searching for information on "conventional" automobile fires. The info I found was a bit dated (from 1990) but said that, in the US, for passenger cars and light trucks, 2.9 out of every 1000 police-reported-crashes—this includes fender-benders as long as they got reported—resulted in a vehicle fire. There were over 85 vehicle fires per day on average (at least 31,500 in a year).

So, if anyone you know says something about "what about fires", try that statistic on them: more than 85 car fires PER DAY, so are you scared of your old gas-powered car now?