Cars commonly catch on fire from electrical issues, overheating, malfunctioning or negeglected maintenance on transfer cases or transmissions. We get a car fire at least once a month. This average increases during the summer and does not count semitrucks/trailer fires.
I'm a firefighter for my county that includes ~ 30mi of interstate along a national corridor. DOT has estimated 11,000 vehicles pass through our county each day on this corridor.
Out of curiosity, how many of those would you say were cars less than a few years old? That more than anything is what catches my attention about this story — anecdotally, I’ve seen car fires on the highway, but always older cars, and a Tesla seems like it shouldn’t have had time to accrue that degree of wear and tear and deferred maintenance. But I’m curious what someone with more data points makes of it.
Wow a firefighter on HN?! Awesome. What upcoming firefighting tech excites you/seems promising? Know any interesting firefighting tech startups? What is a big problem in the firefighting space that you think tech can solve/disrupt? Thanks for your time!
I'm a firefighter for my county that includes ~ 30mi of interstate along a national corridor. DOT has estimated 11,000 vehicles pass through our county each day on this corridor.