Wasn’t this the sort of fire that can’t be doused with water? Is it really out? Maybe those cars (the batteries in particular) are still burning down there in Davy Jones’s Locker?
Were there a lot of EVs on this ship? I’ve heard a few ID.4’s were on board. Were there others?
These damn electric cars burn forever, don’t they? This is instilling me with a lot of confidence when it comes time for me to eventually buy my first electric vehicle. Which I assume we’ll have to do when they eventually stop making ICEs.
Can’t be doused with the amounts of water typically put on a fire by the fire brigade. I don’t think they would still be burning when completely submerged.
What I’ve read about these Class D metal fires (and maybe it only applies to certain burning metals) is that they oxidize strongly enough to suck the oxygen out of water molecules to continue burning, leaving behind those lost and forlorn hydrogens in their wake. Is this correct?
ETA: Okay, here it is: Post #19 above. @Slithy_Tove mentions this about magnesium fires. Would this apply to this fire too?
nm (I incorporated what I wrote here into the post just above.)
Water does two things to a fire. It smothers (deprives the reaction of oxygen) and cools. Fires usually need to maintain a certain temperature to keep going.
Even if this sort of battery fire can keep going when sprayed with water because it doesn’t get smothered, I’m doubtful it could maintain the required temperature when fully submerged.
Also, the energy in a lithium battery decreases when the battery is flat (obviously). If you submerge a battery in salt water it shorts out and would lose its energy rapidly.
I don’t know for sure whether these batteries could burn underwater or not. But I’m doubtful and think that even if they could they wouldn’t burn for long.
As I understand it the recommended course of action if a cell phone battery catches fire (like those Samsung phones that were bursting into flame years ago) is to submerge the phone in water to cool it down.
Those cars are thousands of feet deep. Water pressure increases at depth. I’d think that would help to extinguish any fire.
-* “This morning, during the towing process, which had begun on Feb. 24, the ship ‘Felicity Ace’ lost stability and sank some 25 nautical miles outside of the limits of Portugal’s exclusive economic zone, in an area with a depth of about [9,842 feet],” the navy wrote in Portuguese.
I’m picturing a movie here. It’s called The Splash and the Furious. Dom and the gang, aghast at all of those beautiful cars being consigned to the drink, don diving gear to save them.
10 to one says with in 1-5 years someone actually gets the same thought and tries it
I’m quite sure the thought has already occurred and the time delay was 1-5 milliseconds.
By same thought do you mean movie idea or salvage idea?
knowing this world … probably both at the same time …