@LordEdam@VoxofGod@Sassinake@pluralistic As I understand it, the electrolyte in a Li-ion battery is a lithium salt, not actual lithium. Drowning burning batteries in absurd amounts of water seems to be the preferred option (6000 gallons to put out a burning Tesla — yikes!)
But IANAFF (I Am Not A Fire Fighter), so take anything I say with a grain of some other kind of salt.
I wonder if a dump-truck full of sand emptied out over the wreck would do the trick, or make it worse.
Man, it's times like this that I wish I'd been better at chemistry. I used to give tours on a WW2 ship and we'd talk about the 5" deck guns and the phosphorous rounds. Hit the target and shower it all in white-hot sparks that catch everything on fire, & water just spread it around worse. Yikes.
The US Navy used a torpedo (Mark 50) that used an enormous block of lithium as fuel. The fire extinguishers for it used copper powder. The powder covers the lithium, blocking it from the air. (Not just oxygen, lithium will also react with nitrogen.) The copper also conducts the heat away from the fire.
@brinnbelyea@CaffeinatedBookDragon@angusm@LordEdam@VoxofGod@pluralistic current tactic against water-reactive stuff in the Navy is to push it overboard (using fire mains). Once it’s overboard, keep moving and it’s no longer your emergency. I’m sure the people in the magazines get more advanced training, but since every sailor is a janitor and firefighter first, that’s the basic approach.
Sand is a good fallback. Although the wonderful "Things I Won't Work With" blog has one memorable post called "Sand Won't Save You This Time" (https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/sand-won-t-save-you-time) about a chemical so hellacious that even sand is no help.
Also, white phosphorous is the devil. The US & the Israelis (& probably others) are fond of WP munitions, which they call "illumination rounds", so as not to fall foul of the Geneva Convention.
@LordEdam@angusm@VoxofGod@Sassinake@pluralistic magnesium flares (and aircraft chaff) do the same and the US Navy defines them as class D fires. The preferred solution is to use hoses to push it over the side. Not sure what to do if you don’t have an ocean a firefighting tool.
@pluralistic you know, looking at this again I am suddenly reminded of how, in recent years, there have been a spate of fires here in Singapore mostly affecting residential apartments that were ultimately attributed to, or suspected to be caused by battery fires from e-bikes and e-scooters.
@pluralistic The local government has tightened regulations around such batteries, requiring them to comply with the UL2272 standard; PSAs have also gone out urging people to only buy e-bikes and e-scooters with the appropriate local certification marks, and the proper way to charge them.
@pluralistic Despite that, e-bike and e-scooter fires continue to occur; one just broke out last month at a public housing apartment that was reported to have most likely been caused by an e-bike battery being charged.
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