Hi Kezo, NCAP doesn’t check for this safety issue:
It really is an interesting subject and the Morning Midas is just the latest of a growing number carrier fires, it makes you wonder if this is becoming the new norm.
The Morning Midas was chartered by Anji Logistics, which is a subsidiary of SAIC Motor according to Bloomberg and reports suggest it departed from Yantai, Shandong province, in eastern China, where there is also a SAIC-GM factory producing the Buick Envision electric. Great Wall motors about 140 cars onboard but were quick to say none of their cars on the ship were battery electric and Chery refused to comment.
However it’s understood the fire started on the deck carring around 800 electric cars and the ship reportedly deployed and exhausted it’s carbon dioxide suppressant system and they then called the coast guard.
So it seems battery electric cars are going to cause trouble on the high seas because fires on ships are challenging to extinguish because of the heat generated and risk of reignition, which could burn for days and are becomming a big concern for insurers.
The owners of the car carrier Felicity Ace that sank in the Atlantic in 2022 carrying 4,000 luxury cars including Porche Bentley, along with VW id4’s are suing both Porche and VW on two accounts for the fire originated from the lithium-ion battery of a Porsche model and allege VW failed to inform them of the danger and necessary precautions needed to transport such vehicles.
What’s causing it to become frequent, is it salt water from rough seas getting in or don’t batteries like to swayed back and forth, especially in rough sea’s?
Whats the anser is the question! Do ship owners fire retard decks carrying battery electric cars or do manufacturers contain them in fireproof boxes before shipping, cus it’s clear Co2 isn’t satisfactory where battery fies are concerned?
Thankfully that isn’t our job to decide the next course of action!