No different from the usual horror stories from more established manufacturers. Recall, maybe and re-design. Hope no lives were lot in this incident.
sure it's different, unless you happen to drive a
Pinto or
Jeep . but those cars have not been built for years. Tesla is a new design.
in this case no one was hurt, in fact the fire was limited to the front of the vehicle but was very hard to extinguish. driving around in a car where I know that my batteries can ignite from the same type of things that might puncture my tires might be a bit worry some to people. and then even the fire department had trouble dousing the fire.
gas tanks these days are designed into the area above the rear axle, where it's protected from this type of casual exposure. especially on a $70k sedan. i'd say road debris causing a car fire in other less than one year old $70k MB, BMW, Lexus, or Infinity is a zero percent chance.....unless that road debris is an IED.
but I agree that 'crap happens' every day and car fires can happen to any vehicle if fuel ignites.....but road debris would not cause it. it likely would be some sort of part failure or assembly or service mistake. it would not be a vulnerability inherent in the design.
it's a relevant story since it's a Tesla, and there are not that many, their manufacturer claims they are the safest car, their buyers get government tax subsidies, they are Wall Street darlings, only sell $70k cars, got big start-up government subsidies, are trying an end run around state auto dealer laws, and so are somewhat controversial and newsworthy.
