SACRAMENTO COUNTY, Calif. — With more electric vehicles on the road, firefighters are updating their training to better respond to the new technology.
A Tesla heading eastbound on Highway 50 near Sunrise in Sacramento County caught fire Saturday, nearly costing the driver her life.
“This incident could have been fatal for this person,” said Capt. Parker Wilbourn with the Sacramento Metropolitan Fire District.
Wilbourn said calls of cars catching fire are scenarios firefighters prepare for, but the addition of an electric, high-voltage battery to the mix changes the threat.
“It's common for us to go to vehicle fires. Electric vehicle fires are just a whole different beast,” he said. “On last week’s incident, [the] driver ... noticed smoke billowing from the undercarriage of the vehicle. Thankfully, she was able to pull off the side of the road and exit the vehicle safely, but that fire just continued to grow and ended up actually burning through the hood.”
Crews used 6,000 gallons of water to put out the flames and it’s just the latest in a string of similar incidents the district has responded to this year.
“These fires burn very hot and it is dangerous because there are different chemicals that are being produced,” said Wilbourn. “On a standard internal combustion engine, I can generally put that fire out if that vehicle is fully involved with my 700 gallon water tank on any fire engine that we have, not so much for our EV vehicles. We've had three that have burned in Metro Fire’s jurisdiction, and all of them have taken thousands of gallons of water to extinguish."
According to state data, one in five new vehicle purchases in California are electric and firefighters are adapting their techniques to mitigate the dangers.
“We're continuing to modernize our training and make sure that all of our firefighters on the line understand these vehicles and making sure that everybody is safe, not only fire personnel responding but also the occupants and those around that vehicle,” said Wilbourn.
Fire personnel also want to educate the public on what to do if they witness a fire involving an electric vehicle.
“If safe, remove the vehicle from the road to a safe location that is flat and then safely exit that vehicle, call 911 and stay away from that vehicle," he said.
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