Elon Musk Suits Up For Tesla Model S Fire (VIDEO)

October 30th, 2013 by Zachary Shahan

Originally published on EV Obsession.

I can’t recall ever seeing Tesla CEO, Chairman, and Product Architect Elon Musk wearing a suit. That is, before watching the video below. One of the biggest “hits” to Tesla this year has been the fire that erupted in a Tesla Model S about a month ago. Naturally, there’s some positive spin to this. For example, this allowed Tesla to point out that you’re 5 times more likely to have the car you’re driving in catch fire if it’s a gasmobile than if it’s a Tesla, that the Tesla Model S is designed in such a safe way that the fire never extended into the car and the driver was notified to pull over and call the fire department right away without him having to frenetically do so, that the car has the highest safety rating of any car ever tested in North America, that the owner of that Model S actually went and bought himself another Model S, and more.

Still, a lot of damage control has been needed due to the absurd amount press coverage that has gone towards this single car fire (as opposed to the other 150,000 car fires per year reported by the National Fire Protection Association). So, Elon Musk answered some questions about it on Bloomberg TV… and even wore a suit! Check it out:

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Tags: bloomberg, Bloomberg TV, Elon Musk, Tesla, Tesla Model S, Tesla Model S fire

About the Author

Zachary Shahan spends most of his time here on CleanTechnica as the director/chief editor. Otherwise, he's probably enthusiastically fulfilling his duties as the director/editor of Solar Love, EV Obsession, Planetsave, or Bikocity. Zach is recognized globally as a solar energy, electric car, and wind energy expert. If you would like him to speak at a related conference or event, connect with him via social media. You can connect with Zach on any popular social networking site you like. Links to all of his main social media profiles are on ZacharyShahan.com.

SirSparks

Elon you are our hero! Now PLEASE go sort out Obamacare.
- Bob_Wallace
  
  There’s nothing wrong with Obamacare.
  
  It’s just a slow news period and Republicans, as usual, are doing everything they can do to harm Democratic presidents.
  
  The software should have been better but in the long run everyone will have all the time they need to sign up for coverage which won’t start until January 1. And even if a lot of people wait until the end of December and jam the system up again no one will penalized as long as they get around to signing up by Spring.
  
  Tempest in a friggin’ teapot.
Marion Meads

So now it’s just down to 2.5 times safer than a regular ICE cars when it comes to fire. The Volt on the other hand is now 10 times safer than Tesla when it comes to fire incidence. The Volt so far has only 1 severely delayed fire on an intentionally totalled car that gives its passenger two weeks to get out before it caught fire. The Volt has a total of 488 million miles driven to date.
- Ivor O’Connor
  
  We don’t know that it was a Tesla. You can apparently hear them say it is a VW in the clip. Apparently it was a stunt to get as much coverage as possible and has been withdrawn.
  
  Still it could have been. Many more stats are needed before we can say 5 to 1 or 10 to 1 or .5 to 1. The vehicle is on full warranty for 8 years and is expected to last 10 years with the same set of batteries. So You could say we have at most 1/10th of the cars life cycle under examination so far.
  - eject
    
    It was a Tesla. It got pierced from the bottom in a freak accident running over a weird shaped steel beam. Mind you the battery pack actually prevented the object going into the car. My BMW has only polymer drenched cardboard and 1 mm steel sheeting as a barrier. I might have been impaled.
    
    The car apparently only started burning properly after the firemen did what they do, put holes in the top and fill it with water. This will go away as soon as they get their briefings on how to deal with electric cars.
    
    Never the less, this was a worst case scenario and nothing really bad happened. I am now more happy then before of getting one of those cars, multiple cells pierced and the car could still move to safety and no fire reached into the cabin. What more can you ask?
    - Ivor O’Connor
      
      I believe Marion Meads was talking about the fire that happened yesterday that was all over the internet. Not the one that happened weeks ago.
      - eject
        
        Read the article
        
        ” One of the biggest “hits” to Tesla this year has been the fire that erupted in a Tesla Model S about a month ago.
        Read more at http://cleantechnica.com/2013/10/30/elon-musk-suits-tesla-model-s-fire-video/#Ijk23zobKzriu00j.99“
      - Ivor O’Connor
        
        Yes. I read the article before it was posted here. And I listened to the interview too. And the stat is 5 to 1. Yet if you look closely you see Marion is using a 2.5 to 1 stat. That’s because a second fire would have made it 2.5. However that second fire, yesterday in Mexico, was a hoax. So the articles 5 to 1 ratio still stands.
      - http://zacharyshahan.com/ Zachary Shahan
        
        Was that one really a hoax? Any links on that?
      - Ivor O’Connor
        
        It was on the Tesla Google+ page as another fire. But when you actually listened and watched the video it became unclear. Then the comments on the youtube video started raining down about it being a stunt with a VW dragged into place. Then more complaints to Google about it being a fraud. A few hours after that it got taken down from the Tesla Google+ site. So without being an expert I’m assuming it was not legit.
      - Bob_Wallace
        
        Did you check the Tesla forums?
      - Ivor O’Connor
        
        Wishful thinking on my part that it was a hoax. I see they did not take it down but instead added to it and that’s why it wasn’t in the spot it had been.
        
        Here is the original youtube video with all the comments leading me to think it was a hoax:
        
        However it wasn’t a hoax. Here are the places I somewhat regularly check.
        
        https://plus.google.com/117039636053462680924/posts
        
        http://vimeo.com/teslamotors
        
        https://plus.google.com/+TeslaMotors/posts
        
        https://www.youtube.com/user/TeslaMotors?blend=1&ob=video-mustangbase
        
        http://www.teslamotors.com/forums
- Johnny Le
  
  The problem is that people love to drive the model S. They love that it can go from 0-60 mph in 4 seconds. They love its power, its low center gravity, so I think they drive it a little more reckless. One article says the car was airborne before the crash. So the number of Tesla accidents is probably higher than other cars, but I’m just glad that in every case the driver can walk away uninjured.
  
  I think this is why Elon pushes for autopilot. A collision avoidance feature could have prevented this accident.
  - Matt
    
    Then you should compare it to other 60-90k sports cars. Since they would be driven the same way
  - Ivor O’Connor
    
    Probably took it off traction control too. More sound effects when still touching ground…