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by molbioguy 1457 days ago
Isn't there something besides water that could be used that would be more effective at putting out battery fires? I doubt this is Tesla-specific and the number of EVBs is growing.
2 comments

Boron and Sand. Oops.. Wrong movie.

But something solid would have to be dumped on it that was already strongly oxidized. I'm thinking something like crushed bauxite would have enough strongly bonded oxygen. Its just a matter of getting close enough to it to pile it on. Probably dump a pile of aluminum ore a dozen yards from the fire and use a fire shielded bulldozer to shove it into the fire. Its going to take a rather large and messy pile to do it though. And being just a brain storm, for all we know it might make things worse.

Specialized tools go toward dunking the whole car in a container full of water or delivering the water to the underside of the car. Seems to me that water remains the preferred solution for some good reason. Maybe environmental?
Takes up to 3,000 gallons of water for a 600lbs Lithium ion battery that has caught on fire.

Most promising put out of EV fires is “dunking” the EV: erecting a portable tank wall around the EV on fire and pouring water into it.

Dunking helps to contain environmental spread of 7,000 cells of chemicals. Unfortunately, dunking doesn’t work everywhere (ie, ravine, ditch, pileups, uneven ground).

https://www.firehouse.com/operations-training/article/212550...

For the uneven ground case, if it's not too far gone, say just smoking yet, then moving it first seems a viable option.