Front Page  »  

Tesla semi-truck battery fire shuts down Interstate 80 between

August 19, 2024

By KAREN VELIE

A major interstate connecting California and Nevada is currently shutdown after a Tesla semi-truck crashed and caught fire in the Sierras on Monday morning, according to the CHP. The burning batteries pose a variety of threats.

Shortly after 3 a.m., the semi-truck veered off Interstate 80 and crashed into trees near Emigrant Gap. Because of toxic fumes from the big rig’s batteries, the CHP is asking the public to remain at least a half mile away from the crash site.

“The battery itself, you can’t just spray water on it to put it out. It takes either some sort of dry chemical or very huge amount of water, I’ve heard as much as 40,000 gallons,” CHP Officer Jason Lyman told CBS News.

Fires from lithium-ion batteries release toxic gasses and are difficult to extinguish.

In late July, Interstate 15 connecting Los Angeles with Las Vegas was shutdown for half a day after a semi-truck transporting lithium-ion batteries crashed and caught fire. In May, it took more than two weeks for  firefighters to extinguish a fire at a battery storage facility in Otay Mesa in Southern California.

Meanwhile, Morro Bay residents have voiced concerns regarding the location of a proposed battery storage facility, which is in the heart of the tourist area. Those living near the rock would have to drive towards the fire and the smoke could close down Highway 1, which is their only evacuation route.

 


Loading...
Subjects:     
Related:


13 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments

Anyone remember Stan Meyer who supposedly built a dune buggy that ran on water? He had a business lunch meeting with a couple of people interested in it and said and right after: “They poisoned me” and died. Where did the buggy end up after his lunch meeting death?


Also side-note: The former police officer and security guard Aaron Salter Jr. who was murdered in the Buffalo shooting after a guy supposedly drove 200 miles from his home town to that specific location for a “hate crime”.. He was also working on get this: A truck that ran on water he was trying to get patented.. hmmm..


0

“A truck that ran on water ” Lol, could never prove anything.


There was that local guy (pine tree pete?) who was going to fix the drought with windmills on the grade.


San Luis guy I know had a motor that “would make 10% more power than consumed”, I told him if he can prove it (takes less than an hour) I would drive him to Palo Alto and someone would back up a dump truck of cash, if it works.


No takers yet.


-1

There are quite a few videos of Stan Meyer walking through how it works, how he built it. Not sure if you are familiar with welding, but HHO welding is a thing, so yes, oxygen and hydrogen can be split to create a huge amount of energy. Problem is, it’s too cheap to be viable and people wouldn’t have to pay a ransom to run their cars on it, and it would be non-polluting..


Anything to say about Aaron Salter Jr. “water truck” inventor who was shot at Buffalo working on HHO? Getting the patents and everything, then supposedly the racist guy decides to drive from 200 miles away and shoot him at his point of employment? Nothing about his mysterious death either I guess.. Search YouTube, you can see him talking about the truck before he was dispatched.


The only exhaust byproduct of HHO is literally an huge amount of energy (think 3x gasoline per volume) and pure water.


HHO engines aren’t allowed because it would completely liberate society. Energy is life, and control of it is absolute control.


0

Kinetic energy is the clean renewable energy storage of the future.

Why not use excess power to raise large weights up inside the stacks at Morro Bay power plant, Then, at night slowly release the weights, as they travel down they turn a generator producing power with the advantage of gravity.


-2

Earthquake retrofit cost/insurance would stop using the stacks. However the chimney foundation would make a great location for a inertia energy crane.


We can hide it inside a fake smokestack and put a restaurant at the top for the tourists.


0

I’m cautiously hopeful that by the time the Morro Bay battery facility is actually built, there is a viable alternative to the lithium battery technology. Sodium ion is one such technology, perfectly suited for such a facility, safe, non-toxic, but it is years away from production scale. It’s dangerous to plan a lithium battery facility in the middle of a town. That should never happen.


24

Requiring a safer tech like Sodium ion or a flow battery for a battery facility in the middle of a town is very reasonable request.


3

If thise big rigs drove the posted speed limits instead of 80-90 MPh and stopped changing lanes and like sports cars, these accidents wouldn’t happen.


-38

true: As of May 2024, California has had 2,839 total commercial truck accidents, including 2,819 non-fatal injuries and 20 fatalities. 


0

Hope the Morro Bay voters are paying attention!!


49

Perhaps allowing Tesla to dominate this market is not the best answer. There are other, much safer and less expensive batteries in advanced development stages that would present far less of these kinds of problems.


-48

Hmmm…. So, less problems would be a bad thing? So often confounded by the “thinking” on this site…


-32