FALSE: It is not impossible to put out an electric vehicle fire
Lithium-ion battery fires can be extinguished with special precautions.
A claim that it is impossible to extinguish an electric vehicle fire is FALSE.
This tweet alleged that “it is impossible to put out an electric vehicle fire”, along with a screengrab of a video where a burning car is being thrown into a body of water.
A reverse image search identified the screenshot as one of a video originally posted on a Russian social media site in 2022. The video does not claim that the burning car is an electric vehicle. The translated text accompanying the video states: “They quickly responded and managed to put out the fire. No one was hurt!”
The claim in the tweet contradicts advice from firefighting bodies which recommend extinguishing electric car fires.
The United States Fire Administration says electric cars can cause four types of fires: class A (tyres, fabrics, plastics); class B (fuel); class C (lithium-ion batteries in hybrid and electric cars); and class D (magnesium, titanium, aluminium and lithium).
Electric car fire risks include electrical shock, very high temperatures, toxic fumes and run-off, lithium burns and reignition.
The US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) published a safety report on electric vehicle fires in 2020. It found that “guidance is strong in certain respects but lacking in others” for fighting electric car fires. The report indicates that high voltage shocks, high temperature and reignition of lithium-ion batteries as the largest risk of electric car fires.
The NTSB report provides guidance for fighting electric car fires and calls on firefighting organisations and manufacturers to inform firefighters of the risks of such fires.
The National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) also has special guidance to fight fires in electric and hybrid cars. It advises water as the best method to put out the fires but warns that this takes “much longer” than traditional car fires and that the smoke is toxic. The NFPA has model-specific safety guides for electric cars.
The NFPA provides training for firefighters for electric vehicle fires. Other US institutions provide similar services.
The International Fire Chiefs Association also states that “a large, continuous and sustainable water supply” is needed to fight electric vehicle fires.
The risk of fire in electric cars is much lower than in traditional combustion and hybrid cars, according to US insurance data.
PesaCheck has examined a claim that it is not possible to extinguish electric vehicle fires and finds it to be FALSE.
This post is part of an ongoing series of PesaCheck fact-checks examining content marked as potential misinformation on Facebook and other social media platforms.
By partnering with Facebook and similar social media platforms, third-party fact-checking organisations like PesaCheck are helping to sort fact from fiction. We do this by giving the public deeper insight and context to posts they see in their social media feeds.
Have you spotted what you think is fake or false information on Facebook? Here’s how you can report. And, here’s more information on PesaCheck’s methodology for fact-checking questionable content.
This fact-check was written by PesaCheck climate change fact-checker Christiaan van der Merwe and edited by PesaCheck senior copy editor Cédrick Irakoze and acting chief copy editor Francis Mwaniki.
The article was approved for publication by PesaCheck’s managing editor Doreen Wainainah.
PesaCheck is East Africa’s first public finance fact-checking initiative. It was co-founded by Catherine Gicheru and Justin Arenstein and is being incubated by the continent’s largest civic technology and data journalism accelerator: Code for Africa. It seeks to help the public separate fact from fiction in public pronouncements about the numbers that shape our world, with a special emphasis on pronouncements about public finances that shape the government’s delivery of Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) public services, such as healthcare, rural development and access to water/sanitation. PesaCheck also tests the accuracy of media reportage. To find out more about the project, visit pesacheck.org.
PesaCheck is an initiative of Code for Africa, through its innovateAFRICA fund, with support from Deutsche Welle Akademie, in partnership with a coalition of local African media and other civic watchdog organisations.
