
Mystery at Port Newark: Why Did 17 Plug-In Cars Burn? - tokenadult
http://wheels.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/02/mystery-at-port-newark-why-did-17-plug-in-cars-burn/
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lathamcity
"raising the question of whether this latest incident is a sign of design
flaws, of possible risks associated with plug-in vehicles generally or simply
a result of the abuses wrought by extremely rare weather conditions"

That's lousy journalism - not mentioning what the specific weather conditions
were, and making it sound like the seawater was some sort of simple throwaway
answer instead of the scientifically obvious answer that it actually is.

"Why Did 17 Plug-In Cars Burn?" "What caused more than a million dollars-worth
of plug-in hybrid vehicles, including 16 Fisker Karma luxury sedans, to catch
fire Monday night at Port Newark?"

It really should say what the other car was. It's impossible to guess at any
sort of trend, because the other car could break it and we aren't told what it
was. Was it another Fisker car, indicating a consistent problem with the
company in this instance? Were there similarities in the design? All we know
is that it was a plug-in vehicle.

Wikipedia, by the way, says it was a Prius:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fisker_Karma#Fire_incidents>

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unreal37
The article says it was a Prius. In fact, a couple of other hybrid Prius's
(Prii?) got hot and were smoldering too.

~~~
lathamcity
It never says that the last car in this incident was a Prius, just that "In a
separate incident during the storm, three Toyota Prius hybrids at Port Newark
also were damaged by fire"

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rdl
The cars were total writeoffs as soon as they got covered in seawater, though,
even if they hadn't burned.

I don't think I'll be buying any used cars from the Northeast for the next few
years; same thing happened after Katrina, when sketchy people tried to sell a
bunch of flooded cars.

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ck2
It's not a mystery.

NYT article title should have been " _Submerged in 13 feet of saltwater, high
capacity batteries will burn_ "

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ajross
The chemistry isn't a mystery. But certainly sealing a battery so it doesn't
short when submerged in seawater isn't rocket surgery either. It's an
engineering goof, and a pretty severe one. Figuring out how it happened is
worth investigation, and given the context some of that is going to appear in
the mainstream media.

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sbierwagen
There is no way you're going to waterproof an electric car to the extent it
can survive total immersion in seawater without doubling the cost. Immersing
an electric car in seawater will kill it. Immersing a gasoline burning car in
seawater will kill it. Immersing a gasoline burning _boat_ will probably
destroy the engine too.

Dropping a car in the ocean is far, far outside of the design envelope. It is
simply not reasonable to expect the manufacturer to add cost to endure that
unlikely of an event.

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nekojima
The rather famous 'Top Gear tries to kill a Toyota Hilux'.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&...](https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=xnWKz7Cthkk#t=98s)

The part when the Hilux goes in the English Channel (which is salt water).

~~~
rdl
A diesel, with a far simpler ignition system. (well, old gas cars or dirtbikes
with carbs are kind of the same way, but lack of spark plugs makes diesels
even better with water)

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dchichkov
Prius Plug-In Hybrid packs Lithium 4.2kWh, 600 Volts battery. Add some
seawater to it (which is conductive) and you will get a fire.

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andrewcooke
the original post (with photos) is here -
[http://updates.jalopnik.com/post/34669789863/more-than-a-
doz...](http://updates.jalopnik.com/post/34669789863/more-than-a-dozen-fisker-
karma-hybrids-caught-fire-and)

why on earth can't the nyt link to posts?

