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Luton airport fire


ditchman
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1 hour ago, vmaxphil said:

All this hype about ev cars catching fire did we not have a batch of Vauxhall's catching fire not long ago?

Two shiploads carrying several thousands of completed (German?) cars have sunk in the past couple in the years, blamed on EV's. This one and one earlier

 

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I'm about 10 miles cross country from the airport and I heard the explosions, sounded like distant thunder. I didn't know about the fire until I heard it on the news the next day.

 

I've no idea of the statistics, but after 45 years in the motor industry my experience is that cars catching fire is fairly rare, I've seen a number of vehicles that have been driven about with quite severe fuel leaks that haven't gone up.

There certainly seems to be more reported recently, perhaps EV fires are at a similar rate to other vehicle fires, it's just they're more newsworthy.

With all those vehicles in close proximity any fire was going to be difficult to contain, the fact there was no sprinkler system fitted is beyond belief.

No doubt the cost of this will be passed onto all of us by the insurance companies by way of increased premiums.

 

7 hours ago, vmaxphil said:

All this hype about ev cars catching fire did we not have a batch of Vauxhall's catching fire not long ago?

Certain Vauxhall's had form for fire's starting within the cabin blower motor, some not all, were caused by a bodged repair in response to a design fault.

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On 11/10/2023 at 12:17, udderlyoffroad said:

Seems it was a relatively new structure built without a sprinkler system.  What utter ****wittery.  Bet the interruption to flight ops has already cost them more than the sprinkler system would have.

Incidentally, whether the initial source of ignition was an ICE or EV - and it looks increasingly likely that it was a Diesel Range Rover - I've said on here before that we need to update building regulations where EVs congregate to mitigate the effects of thermal runaway.  And actual experts are saying this too.

Open car parks aren't required to have a sprinkler system and are only required to have 15 minutes structural fire resistance.  That was based originally the fire involving only a single vehicle.  Unfortunately even though it is thought to have started in a diesel car, many new cars have Lithium 12v system batteries and add to that the Lithium batteries of any adjacent vehicles are also going to be heat affected and degrade.  The design of these structures is surely now going to have to be reassessed in the light of increasing electric vehicle fires.  The Fire Brigades Union and many individual experts are calling for a complete reassessment on the use of Lithium batteries.  Personally I won't ever buy an electric car powered by Lithium cells nor will I ride in one.  I also won't ride a Lithium battery powered bus.  Hydrogen cells are the same way to go.  This government and the car industry rushed into what is now determined to be flawed technology.  The date for ending fossil fuel powered cars has already been put back and I suspect it will be put back even further until hydrogen fuel cells are viable alternative.  In the meantime please do not park your Lithium battery powered vehicle in a garage attached to a dwelling or too near your dwelling (personal advice as a retired fire officer but well meant).

Edited by Biffo1262
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Some of these upmarket versions have a fuel fired heater (Ebespacher or Webasto) that burn fuel to pre warm the car.  They can either be operated by a timer in the car's 'climate control system' as my BMW was, or from a remote keyfob (the RangeRover a fried had used this method). They were standard on some versions of the BMW X5 and mine never worked (never wanted it anyway as my car was garaged and the fumes would fill the garage), but a neighbours cut in every day and he couldn't stop it.  I know some RangeRovers also had these.  The fuel fired heater prewarmed the coolant and operated the interior fan and a small coolant circulating pump to pre-warm the car.

One 'risk' was that the fume exhaust came out underneath and grass/leaves may have built up around it?  Just a thought.  There were all sort of dire warnings in the handbook about having them checked and not using in warm weather - or when car garaged (fume build up).

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1 hour ago, London Best said:

Strange. I’ve had over a dozen and none of those have caught fire.

ive had landrovers since 1977.....all fine......then they started making the arty farty ones for the la-la brigade......................more time in the dealership than out

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All this hype about ev cars catching fire did we not have a batch of Vauxhall's catching fire not long ago?

Vauxhall Zafiras - the pollen filter behind the glove box. When you looked at how close to the open electrics and the paper filter were - also fan assisted - you could appreciate just how easily a fire could start. From memory a mixture of dodgy electric parts / badly installed. 

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Modern cars are permanently live the ignition switch is no more than a device to send a signal to the ecu and mechanical steering lock ( sometimes! )

the ecu is controlling sending big amps to start the vehicle or heated screen seats 

put this another way modern cars with lots of auxiliary services can go up due to a minor electrical issue !

Putting out fires on electric cars is an art o believe 

Agriv8

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Hi

Given that most cars seem to be 'over-cooked' I doubt if you could say with 'beyond reasonable doubt' which particular vehicle and how it was the cause/start of the fire.

Mis-information and theories will abound in the 'fog of environmental activisim' - if electric this will be surpressed but any other form of power - ..'yes, that was the one that done it, get rid of'!

L

 

 

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52 minutes ago, Loki said:

Hi

Given that most cars seem to be 'over-cooked' I doubt if you could say with 'beyond reasonable doubt' which particular vehicle and how it was the cause/start of the fire.

Mis-information and theories will abound in the 'fog of environmental activisim' - if electric this will be surpressed but any other form of power - ..'yes, that was the one that done it, get rid of'!

L

 

 

There appears to be CCTV 'footage' showing the start of the fire around the front kerbside corner of a red Range Rover.  The accompanying news report stated it was diesel powered.  The CCTV would appear to be pretty conclusive as to just where and what vehicle was the source.  The 'diesel powered' may be more 'assumption' unless the actual vehicle model/variant is known.  In the footage I saw, the registration number wasn't sufficiently clear to read, but I'm guessing that with a little work (possibly earlier pre ignition footage?)  it could be read, or the time of arrival cross checked with other CCTV records (entry lane cameras)?

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