How Common are Tesla Fires?

The biggest objection of car enthusiasts and critics towards electric vehicles encompasses the dangers of lithium-ion batteries. Anytime electric vehicles start coming into conversations, their susceptibility to catching fire starts making car owners think otherwise.

However, the irony of the matter is that the lithium-ion batteries inside a Tesla or any other electric vehicle are the same battery cells that power most smartphones. Yet, not many people seem to mention the fire threats that they carry inside their pockets.

Lithium-ion Batteries and fire threats

Lithium-ion batteries power most of the gadgets and electronic items inside your homes. They account for a vast majority of household items. Considering their widespread use, the instances of them catching fire is rare. However, whenever they do light up in sparks and flames, it is due to a reaction referred to as a thermal runaway.

Thermal runaway

In an event of a thermal runaway, a cell will tend to short. Keep in mind that the battery pack of a Tesla involves a set of cells aligned with each other to power the vehicle. Therefore, one cell shortage can cause a chain reaction and increase the temperatures of the cells around it, causing a drastic thermal runaway, and slowly leading to a fire.

In a small battery, this tends to happen almost instantaneously because the battery generally consists of only one cell. Whereas in a Tesla, the battery consists of thousand cells, and each of the cells has protective shielding from the passenger.

Also, the systematic design of Tesla’s battery pack includes a monitoring computer that ensures passenger protection when the battery condition becomes hostile. Hence, comparing the Tesla lithium-ion battery to any other item is a far-fetched analogy.

Moreover, if you find the idea of Teslas catching fire alarming, then take into account reports by fire departments regarding combustion engine vehicles catching fire. According to a study by the National Fire Protection Association, fire departments in the US have to deal with an average of two hundred and eighty-seven thousand gasoline vehicles every year.

Another scary statistic is that an average of 500 fatalities occurs every year due to vehicle fires, only in the US. Despite the increasing numbers of conventional vehicles catching fire, they do not make headlines in the news. This is largely due to the commonality of this event.

On the other hand, each and every Tesla fire is subject to vast media attention. This is because there are many biases and allegations that people have towards Teslas.

How many Teslas catch fire?

To put things into perspective, you are more likely to expect a gas and diesel car fire than an electric car fire. Data supports that for one Tesla car fire, about 50,000 gas and diesel fires occur. From the dataTesla provides for 2012 to 2020, one Tesla fire occurred for every 205 million miles.

To measure the exact number of Tesla fires is difficult because a fire outbreak can have many variable causes. Most of the vehicle fires of EV’s result after collisions at high speeds, while others revolve around other issues apart from battery overheating.

What you can do in the face of a fire?

It usually takes plenty of time for a thermal runaway to result in a disastrous fire outbreak. Thus, before the thermal runaway begins to cause damage, a passenger inside a Tesla has a good amount of time to evacuate the car, particularly because the monitoring system inside the Tesla keeps the driver well aware of potentially critical battery conditions.

Final words

As a Tesla driver, you can worry less about a fire than driving a gas or diesel vehicle. Nevertheless, you should be aware of  the possibility of it happening, and stay vigilant regarding battery health and maintenance to minimize the probability of an electric vehicle fire.


Pierce Keesee

Pierce Keesee

Technology enthusiast with background in battery building and electronic repair
Washington, DC