Tesla Investigates After Parked Model S Appears To Explode In China (cnn.com) 284
"CNN reports on CCTV footage from China showing a parked Model S bursting violently into flames," writes Slashdot reader dryriver. From the report: Tesla is investigating after one of its vehicles appeared to explode in China. A short video of surveillance footage posted on Chinese social media site Weibo (WB) showed white smoke emerging from what looks like a white Tesla car parked at a lot in Shanghai. After a few seconds, the electric vehicle bursts into flames and the clip ends soon afterward. The video, which was filmed just after 8:15 pm local time on April 21, appears to show a Tesla Model S sedan. It was posted on Chinese social media a couple of hours later and has since been shared widely. The clip attracted a mix of derision and outrage on Weibo. "Us car owners demand an explanation," wrote user Miao Hongyang. "Jeopardizing our safety in a moment's instant and the fact it ignited so quickly is something we will not tolerate." Another Weibo user registered under the name Your Dad, added: "One thing I've learned from this incident: from now on, don't ever park next to a Tesla.'"
Communist Party extortion scheme (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Communist Party extortion scheme (Score:5, Insightful)
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If you want to push that theory then the US has already escalated well beyond this point by trying to extradite a senior Huawei employee and getting Huawei products banned in many countries. If China was going to play Trump's game they would't dick about setting cars on fire, they would start rounding up Microsoft and Amazon staff in China and blocking US companies completely.
Remember that back in the real world China's strategy here is to simply wait Trump out (election next year).
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China have done similar to Canada - where they declared canola imports 'contaminated with pests' and used it as a pretext to ban.
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Remember that back in the real world China's strategy here is to simply wait Trump out (election next year).
That's my strategy, too.
I can't imagine what he'll be replaced with though. The democrats don't seem to have learned much from the last election.
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I can't imagine what he'll be replaced with though. The democrats don't seem to have learned much from the last election.
They learned to at least have a more open primary...a little too open, but that's besides the point...
Re:Communist Party extortion scheme (Score:4, Insightful)
So to restate; your theory is China chose a target you believe they think he does not care about as a way of retaliating against Trump...
I absolutely believe the Chinese start little fires all the time to discover what they can get away with and gain insights into what a larger American response might look like. This could certainly be that (both literally in this case as well as figuratively). However I don't think its 'retaliatory'. I think the Chinese leadership as well as much of our own leadership believe our economies are quite tied together for the time being, and neither is going to rock the boat. If its anything other than 'shit-test' so to speak its for domestic propaganda use.
The Chinese have a long term plan to unwind our economic relationship. I don't think we do and I don't think we will like the Chinese plan much. Which is one reason I strongly support Trump pouring as much gasoline and setting fire to US-Sino relations and policy because blowing things up now is waaaay better for us than it will be simply waiting around for China to make their move. I think if we acknowledged them as the cold war enemy they are and timed some aggressive trade restrictions to their economic cycle we do things to them like leave them with major production and housing overhang in cities and probably cause some quite crippling economic shocks; we'd feel them too but I think we could make them feel it deeper. Mix in a little propaganda effort of our own and maybe gin up enough civil unrest to cause some real chaos over there.
However the window of opportunity to ensure American hegemony for the century to come is rapidly closing and loose cannons like Donald Trump are the best the average American has any real hope of getting elected. Sadly the rest of our political class is two stupid, cowardly, or actively seeking to sabotage America for their own gain to even admit there is a problem.
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China did not start the trade war.
China, like virtually all developed nations has discovered that you get richer by trading with people than by having wars with them, especially if they possess the weapons to level all your cities.
As for American hegemony. That ship has sailed.
Re:Communist Party extortion scheme (Score:4, Interesting)
Claps for you AC or should I say NPC. You managed to turn my support for Trump's belief in a more aggressive posture toward China for my support for his specific policy. Maybe you just quit reading before I pointed out that his policy isn't a specific plan or where I called him out as a " loose cannon" or more likely you just proved you are just another ignorant buffoon than thinks saying 'derp derp derp Orange Man baaadd' as a response to literally anything that happens makes you look smart somehow. Let me guess you majored in something that began with "critical" and ended with "theory".
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Sooooo what you are saying is that China wants to extort something out of America in the trade wars but they deliberately chose a company that the administration doesn't care about?
Re:Communist Party extortion scheme (Score:4, Insightful)
BYD makes ten times as many electric cars (Score:2)
BYD alone makes ten times as many electric cars as Tesla does. Combined with other Chinese companies, it's probably 20 times Tesla's production. Tesla is very popular with 25-35 males in the United States, globally they're insignificant in business terms.
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BYD alone makes ten times as many electric cars as Tesla does. Combined with other Chinese companies, it's probably 20 times Tesla's production. Tesla is very popular with 25-35 males in the United States, globally they're insignificant in business terms.
In 2018, I'm pretty sure Tesla outsold BYD's electric cars, though not by a lot. Either way, they're within a few percent of each other. Maybe you were comparing against all BYD sales (most of which are either gasoline or hybrid, not all-electric)?
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Plug-in hybrids typically have low-double-digit all-electric range, which means you can't typically just leave your car plugged in at night every night and never have to worry about stopping for fuel. Even my relatively short commute to and from work couldn't happen on a plug-in hybrid without charging at work, which means spending time going outside to plug in
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> Even my relatively short commute to and from work couldn't happen on a plug-in hybrid without charging at work
False. You can drive a plug-in hybrid 400 miles without charging. Can't do that with a Tesla.
You completely missed the point. With a hybrid, if your regular commute goes beyond the highly limited all-electric range, you're using gasoline, which means at random and inconvenient times, you have to stop and refuel. The frequency of doing so depends on how much beyond the all-electric range your commute is. With an electric, except in the rare situations where you actually have to go 300+ miles in a single round trip, you don't have to stop for gasoline OR charging. It "just works" when you need it
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If they were going to do this, why would they pick Tesla to vilify? Surely there are larger American companies in China.
China has its own companies that are Chinese versions of Tesla. Since they import a lot of oil, China is very interested in electric cars. It could be that one of these companies made the video. It could be that an investor in one of these companies did it. It could be legit. I wouldn't necessarily conclude that the CCP is behind the video. They whip up the military and some of the population pretty constantly with the propaganda that the USA is constantly seeking to destroy them. I wouldn't rule
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Re:Communist Party extortion scheme (Score:4, Interesting)
And I'm surprised that a surveillance camera is not that stable at all. Shouldn't a surveillance camera be mounted to the wall/ceiling? Besides, if it is moving, it should be smoothly moving to one direction back and forth? The video shows that the camera is moving a little bit as if someone is holding it. The shaking doesn't look like it is from lens adjusting because lens adjusting should be blur in and out but still stable. To me, this is someone making the video, not an accident.
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If they were going to do this, why would they pick Tesla to vilify? Surely there are larger American companies in China.
It's not the company, it's the product. Electric cars are a big deal in China right now, they don't want foreigners in there.
Watching the video: It's a huge explosion. Nothing like a lithium fire.
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And also the Spinal Tap drummers.
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Doubtful, given that Tesla is building a big factory in China which is partly Chinese owned.
These kinds of catastrophic battery failures happen from time to time with Teslas, usually after they have been damaged somehow. Maybe this one ran over something.
Re:Communist Party extortion scheme (Score:5, Interesting)
What better way to push Tesla into making concessions on obligatory tech transfer to Chinese Partners who can then move on to the Chinese BEV/Battery makers?
That's a nice car you're making there, we wouldn't want any more "spontaneous" combustion incidents (that only happen "spontaneously" without any external cause to Chinese Teslas) to occur, now would we?
Is this really far-fetched for a government that is openly hacking into every political and economic target they can?
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If they wanted the tech they could just pass a law mandating the transfer. As it is they only just relaxed the rules on joint Chinese ownership of western operations in China.
It does seem far fetched that they would go to such lengths when there are easier options.
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If they wanted the tech they could just pass a law mandating the transfer.
The problem with this is it scares away other companies they may want to "transfer" in the future.
They'd like everyone to try getting into China, then pick-and-choose the "good" ones to steal IP from, using the leverage of that company's already-existing Chinese market.
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If Tesla cars were prone to doing this we would have heard about this by now. As such, my conclusion that this is a setup by Communist Party of China to justify ban/tech extortion scheme as part of trade war with Trump.
Who left a Samsung Galaxy in the car?
Assigning blame (Score:2)
If Tesla cars were prone to doing this we would have heard about this by now. As such, my conclusion that this is a setup by Communist Party of China to justify ban/tech extortion scheme as part of trade war with Trump.
My dad was a volunteer fireman with a radio monitor in the car, and he sometimes got a call in the middle of driving somewhere else, and he sometimes drove to the fire directly instead of the fire station(*), and sometimes I happened to be in the car when this happened.
I know first-hand that ICE cars sometimes catch fire and burn. They don't explode like you see on TV and the movies(**), but I saw one go from lit to completely-engulfed-in-flames in less than 30 seconds, which surprised me at the time. It wa
Something seems funny (Score:2)
Awfully handy how the car is parked facing out, directly in tenspot the camera has the best view of... how many cameras does that parking garage have?
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In China, security camera's are everywhere. There could be dozes of cameras in a parking garage. If something actually happens, you want to have some decent footage. It would be pointless to see someone breaking into a 20-pixel big car in the distance.
So what? (Score:4)
In 1987, I parked a Dodge Omni owned by PennDOT. Soon, white smoke emerged from it. A fire had ignited under the hood. After it had burned itself out, we could see that all hoses and other non-metallic components were completely melted or turned to ash.
In 2014, my coworker parked a Fiat 500 that she had rented from National. Soon, white smoke emerged from it. A fire had ignited under the hood. The Seal Beach fire department arrived.
If either of these incidents had been caught on video, I don't think any news organization would be interested in them.
Every few weeks I see car fires. (Score:2)
Every few weeks I see a New Report about a Car fire in my local area. A friend of mine had witnessed one with the driver still locked in the car, the flames in car fire are too hot to be able to help rescue the person. This is with standard Internal Combustion Engine cars.
To hear about an Single Electric Car Fire across the globe, seems to show how much safer electric car technology is compared to IC Cars.
Plus also it would be interested to see if there were any modifications done to it, outside the fact
Re: Every few weeks I see car fires. (Score:4, Insightful)
"To hear about an Single Electric Car Fire across the globe, seems to show how much safer electric car technology is compared to IC Cars."
I don't think that's a clear comparison. The difference in the number of ic versus ev vehicles on the road is huge. My guess is we will see more of these as ev vehicle use increases. Im sure we will just consider it acceptable risk, just like fires with other products.
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I don't think that's a clear comparison. The difference in the number of ic versus ev vehicles on the road is huge.
It's too bad we can't do something like divide the number of fires by the number of vehicles to compensate for this difference.
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Every few weeks I see a New Report about a Car fire in my local area.
Where the heck do you live - Watts? I live in the Seattle area, which is fairly populous, and I haven’t seen a car fire in probably 20 years.
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Every few weeks I see a New Report about a Car fire in my local area.
I used to drive a 1987 Mazda RX7 Turbo 2. The 2nd gen models had a tendency to have engine fires later on in their life due to a stupid part they put on the fuel rail. The Fuel Pulsation Dampener was a spring that went on the end and was supposed to dampen any kind of vibrations on the fuel line. 10+ years into it's life though it would start to wear out and possibly leak gas into the engine bay. Some people kept fire extinguishers in their FCs in case of engine fire. One guy talked about how it saved
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Yes, anything that is holding energy could possibly malfunction and discharge the energy, and such discharge is normally converted to heat, which mixed with Oxygen and a Fuel source creates fire, which then will release more energy from the fuel source.
My phone in my pocket, the Laptop I am writing on, capacitors used in my desk phone, could all fail can cause a fire.
However the point is Car Fires from ICE happen all the time, yes often from bad maintenance. But we are not hearing about hundreds of Electr
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Then fueled by the gasoline. An electric car can and obviously does catch on fire. However they are more rare, as they don't have as much access to a fuel source that is easily combustible.
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Not the same (Score:2)
"Burst into flames" =/= "explode"
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"Burst into flames" =/= "explode"
Yes, but it will explode in the Hollywood recreation of the event.
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Hooray for premature evaluations! (Score:5, Insightful)
Among other things, this is a great example of why social media should never be reported on. It just amplifies idiocy.
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Trials by media, which are admittedly less accurate, offer the advantage of being faster and more satisfying and lucrative to the various outlets which carry the trials. When trials by media aren't available, science by media is a good standby.
Video seems to be edited (Score:5, Interesting)
Edited video posted a day before the self driving event and the earnings calls makes it suspicious.
The previous incidents of "spontaneous combustion" turned out to have debris strike, and bullet fired from the back seat into the battery pack.
This is a win-win scenario for the anti-Tesla activists. Any one taking pains to debunk it can be painted as a fan-boi. And by the time truth comes one no one would care, no news outlet will give the final report the same prominence these initial edited videos get.
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Re:Video seems to be edited (Score:4, Interesting)
If you play frame-by-frame, the video is without a doubt altered.
The grey overlay is 100% fabricated. As the smoke starts to flow out from under the car, and AS it is doing this, the grey overlay starts to appear over the WHOLE video.
Then "FLASH" an "explosion" (paired with some really weird music).
Re:Video seems to be edited (Score:4, Interesting)
Someone is filming a security monitor (presumably with their phone).
The monitor displays a constant overlay with a time code. In the beginning the time code is white, but at the moment of the explosion, the software in the monitor sees so much light that it decides to switch the time code to black. Maybe there's a small delay involved, or maybe the difference in frame rate between monitor and phone causes some jitter, explaining the irregularities.
Re:Video seems to be edited (Score:4, Insightful)
So, second 19 is half the length of the others, and second 20 50% longer, at the exact moment when the fire bursts forth, by sheer coincidence?
Be serious. Someone wanted to make this look worse than it was.
Re:Video seems to be edited (Score:5, Interesting)
at the exact moment when the fire bursts forth, by sheer coincidence?
Not a coincidence. The sudden bright light from the explosion causes the playback software to change time code from white to black. It's possible that this introduces a small offset.
But Let's say it was manipulated a bit around the 19-20 second mark. Does that really make a difference ?
It's still a huge fire that develops within 10 seconds.
And if the whole thing is faked, why make such an obvious mistake with the time code ?
Re:Video seems to be edited (Score:5, Informative)
Bright flashes do not make dates change
No, the date doesn't change. What changes is the synchronization between the real time clock, and the overlay.
Here's my theory: the camera has a real-time clock chip with the current date/time. The camera also has a display overlay image that is mixed with camera feed. The overlay image is a bitmap, generated by the internal CPU. Every 25 frames (or whatever), the CPU reads the real-time clock chip, and then renders a new bitmap to update the overlay. It could do it every frame, of course, but it saves CPU time by only doing once a second.
When the brightness suddenly changes (due to explosion), this forces the CPU to render the image at that frame, because it needs to invert the color scheme. That also resets the internal frame counter, causing a shift in the synchronization between RTC and overlay render. It's not a matter of lag, but just a different sample time of the RTC.
Seriously, are you so anti-Tesla
No, I'm a big Tesla fan, but I just like to point out bullshit when I see it, no matter what side it is coming from.
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It's shaking because someone's playing back the security cam footage on a monitor, and then using their cell phone to record it.
Re:Video seems to be edited (Score:4, Interesting)
Actually that's normal for those kinds of overlays. For some reason instead of putting a border around the text they check the brightness of the video under it and select either light or dark text to provide contrast. It's very common with CCTV.
What does look odd is the dropped frame when the explosion happens, although again it could be the camera exceeding the data rate of a single frame or changing to a new file or something else. Without the original files we will never know.
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I agree it looks odd, but nevertheless EVs should be able to survive being shot without it causing a catastrophic fire in most cases.
Mythbusters actually tested this aspect of "movie physics" where bullets make combustion cars... combust. They found that it's damn near impossible to detonate a tank of petrol with a bullet. Same goes for debris striking the underside of the car etc. Modern cars are pretty safe.
Hopefully we can get EVs to the same level of robustness.
Re:Video seems to be edited (Score:5, Interesting)
Watch it and time the seconds shown on the screen. Second 19 (when the "explosion" happens) is half the length of all the others. Second 20 is 50% longer than all of the other. But the audio track is left untouched. By speeding up second 19 and lengthening second 20, they make a fire look like an explosion.
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Apparently the blind can still type.
Comment removed (Score:3)
Uhmmm.... "appears" to explode? (Score:2)
Can someone explain to me how what that footage caught is not *actually* an e
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Yes, could be a deliberate setup to damage Tesla.
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But if the headline says "Parked Model S explodes", there's an implicit assumption that it was spontaneous. People already get carried away by assumptions, so there's no harm in being careful not to overstate the facts.
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Other than that it can be confusing, you mean?
The headline could also say "Released Security Footage Captures Explosion of Parked Model S", which by not using the verb "Explodes" together with a subject of "Tesla" does not create that implication at all, and states literally what happened, neither adding or taking anything away from the event.
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"Released Security Footage Captures Explosion of Parked Model S"
Would you feel that headline would be completely appropriate if it turns out to be a movie stunt with a prop, and that the "security camera" was in fact a regular camera, set up for this shot ?
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Maybe it was leaked, not released :)
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Re:Uhmmm.... "appears" to explode? (Score:5, Interesting)
Is it just me or does that phrasing suggest that something that happens to look like an explosion of some kind could actually ever be something else entirely?
Can someone explain to me how what that footage caught is not *actually* an explosion? What else can it possibly be?
The video jumps directly from 19 to 20 seconds and they hold the 20 second frame for a couple of seconds, I’m guessing, to make it look way more dramatic. That little edit makes the entire incident questionable.
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It's hard to tell the difference between an explosion and a fast-growing fire. Gasoline isn't explosive, for example. Just really, really flammable.
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Who's doing wordsmithing here? You're trying to say that because something ignites explosively that it is an explosion. Explosives provide their own oxygen, while fires require an outside source. Appearance can tell you it appears to be an explosion, but you can't say for sure.
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Can someone explain to me how what that footage caught is not *actually* an explosion? What else can it possibly be?
I see flames shoot out from under the car and then the car catches on fire. What did you see?
It literally does not explode. There would be glass, plastic, and metal shrapnel everywhere if it did. Pack some TNT or C4 in the car if you want an explosion.
I don't see any way to tell if the car self-ignited or if this was a staged event. Any pyrotechnician could stage what we saw on the camera.
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Personally I am suspicious of how the "surveillance" camera points more towards the incident just after it starts
The footage is of someone filming a monitor with their phone. After a few seconds, you can see the edge of the monitor on the left.
Combust much? (Score:2)
"Us car owners demand an explanation...Jeopardizing our safety in a moment's instant and the fact it ignited so quickly is something we will not tolerate."
175,000 cars catch fire every year in the United States. And with China having basically three times more everything, I'm pretty sure their statistics are on par, so perhaps they can shut the hell up about what they will and will not tolerate.
"One thing I've learned from this incident: from now on, don't ever park next to a Tesla."
Oh, you won't park next to a Tesla? Statistically, they're one of the safest cars to park next to, moron. Good luck gambling with those ICE cars. I'm sure your ignorance will keep you safe.
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And how many of those caught fire while parked and with the engine off?
There was actually a rash of that in Italian and German sports cars not so long ago, super-high end cars too. BMW recently issued a recall because it happened to some of their cars [nbcmiami.com]. And anecdotally, my dad's Toronado caught fire and burned down in our driveway in the middle of the night. So the short answer is "a lot more than you think", and the long answer is the same as the short answer, but appended with "jackass".
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Very very incorrect.
Gas cars catch fire and burn garages and houses down all the time. If you have an attached garage your fire insurance costs about 20% more just because of that risk.
TikTok effect (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't trust any video coming from China as not being staged anymore.
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The USA is falling behind in fake news and video productivity. We must mobilize the next generation of fakers and riggers so that we can compete on the global market for BS. We need to leverage cutting edge AI to generate BS at levels and speeds that no man has ever seen before. Okay, and women. To explore strange new ways to make BS. Let's make American BS Great Again. Invent brave bold malarky that you and your grandchildren can be prou
Internal Combustion? (Score:3)
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If the battery is damaged and a run away reaction occurs in the battery a fire can start. The battery is covered by about 0.2 inches (10mm) of titanium shell so to penetrate the battery takes a significant impact. Previous fires were caused by vehicles hitting roadside debris that severely damaged the battery. In these cases you would have likely seen a similar fire with a gasoline vehicles as the same debris would have likely ripped the fuel line.
There are hundreds of thousands of car fires every year in t
Look closely (Score:5, Funny)
Those were Tasla cars.
Aggressive mode (Score:3)
Damn electric cars (Score:2)
Why don't they just take a safety lesson from this incident and drive around with tanks full of gasoline?
Here’s a novel idea (Score:5, Funny)
How about we wait for at least a small amount of actual information before we start debating about this?
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Yeah I was referring to both sides - which includes yours.
Ship hattens, but... (Score:2)
Stuff happens. Gasoline-powered cars also catch fire, due to fuel leaks and other problems. [reddit.com] I once had this happen to me: engine running, waiting at a traffic light, and...flames. High quality GM engineering back in the 1970s, details unimportant now, though it was...exciting...at the time.
There's a lot of energy stored in a battery. It's entirely believable that an electric car could suffer a short and catch fire. We don't have enough statistics to know if this happens more or less often than for gasoline
[Video deleted by Chinese Government] (Score:2)
Hacked by Russians... (Score:2)
UXP - UneXploded Pinto (Score:2)
In the Netherlands yesterday as well. (Score:3)
In the Netherlands yesterday as well. [culemborgsecourant.nl] Summary: fairly new Tesla burnt for as yet unknown reason.
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Fire does spread from one thing to another quite readily.
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We have chinese made cars here in the USA? about 50,000 imported from China each year, they're kind of rare
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The video has been edited. There is plenty to gain by Chinese EV makers if Tesla receives bad press. We'll probably never know the truth.. well because the Chinese government controls the news. I've been to China, the English language newspaper I got was humorous.
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I don't see where it says it took 5 days to put the fire out?
Where does this 5 day thing come from anyway? This strains credibility on all levels, especially since none of the first responder guides or NFPA documentation mention anything about expecting a multi-day battle.
=Smidge=
Re:American engineering at its finest! (Score:5, Insightful)
...Posted on Slashdot. Over the Internet. In English. (The dirty hypocrite probably has an entire larder of ASCII at home, too)
But god DAMN. This isn't even subtle propaganda. Remember when we had to fear marketers and politicians co-opting good movements and nudging society with campaign slogans sneakily inserted through 7 layers of shell corporations and PR firms were like mysterious shadow puppeteers? This is the discount back-water poor villager with only a smartphone at the mcDonalds wifi sort of levels of PR propaganda. And not just this one 50 cent anonymous drive-by. News in general is letting the façade of neutrality slip. Low effort journalism is allowing low-effort propaganda actually make contact with eyeballs.
So when is China's Tesla knockoff coming out?