Electric Vehicles Pose Risks for Emergency Responders

August 02, 2021

First responders in a crisis rely on their training and experience to deal with potentially dangerous situations. These first responders will need to learn new skills as electric vehicles become more mainstream.

Electric Vehicles Pose Risks for Emergency Responders

Untrained persons could be exposed to high voltage from an electric vehicle fire. This is a very scary possibility. What would an average first responder do in the event of a road accident? How would they safely shut off the power source to the car's battery. What about a garage fire, where an EV is being charged?

TheNational Transportation Safety BoardThe National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), is aware that electric vehicles can pose a danger to passengers, untrained repair crews, and response teams. Recently, the agency released a report titled "Safety risks to emergency responders from lithium-ion battery fires in electric vehicles."

This long report contains several case studies, as well as a section called "Guidance to Emergency Responders".

This guideline includes:

Simple to understand battery disconnect procedures

Teams will need to have access to information to help them understand how to remove the battery from specific vehicles.

Fire Suppression Methods

NTSB recommends large quantities of water to cool and extinguish flames.

The possibility of thermal runaway and re-ignition

It is important to immediately dispatch emergency and repair personnel to prevent re-ignitions, which can occur weeks after the initial battery damage.

Methods to remove stranded electricity from damaged batteries

Those who are involved in the repair, storage, and recovery of damaged EVs must deal with stored energy in them, especially if wiring or external circuits have been damaged.

Formatting emergency response guides

Standard format emergency guides are useful for first responders who can quickly find the information they need with minimal searching.

Updated guidance and information sharing

Safety guides and manuals for vehicle manufacturers should be updated to ensure that fire and rescue crews are better equipped to repair and store damaged EVs.

Firefighters and emergency personnel have decades of experience with working on vehicles with internal combustion engines. There are many best practices to safely work around damaged gasoline-powered vehicles and trucks.

These traditional methods are not applicable to electric vehicles. For emergencies such as flood, wreck, or fire, EVs will require different procedures. Even the most experienced first responders need to be trained in how to deal with EVs in an emergency. The failure to fully understand high voltage mechanisms can spell disaster for first responders, crews, and others.

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