Here's a real-world traffic accident - an out-of-control Camry crashes into a Volt, completely demolishing it. Which car catches fire? The Camry, of course:
http://www.hybridcars.com/news/chevy-volt-virtually-demolished-did-not -catch-fire-46583.html
Camry crashes into a Volt, completely demolishing it. Which car catches fire? The Camry, of course
...Does it matter which car burned? look at how smashed up the volt is. Would you want to be inside there?
Yes, it matters which car burned. The Camry was pretty smashed up, too, and sent its driver to the hospital with severe injuries. Again, the Camry caught fire. The Volt didn't.
Nobody is claiming that the Volt is invulnerable. A severe enough accident will reduce any car to twisted rubble. And a reminder that all safety testing agencies rate Volt a perfect 5-stars for safety.
Volt detractors have claimed, and keep claiming that the car is some sort of a fire risk. But, as the article, and the additional article below points out, there have now been a number of traffic accidents involving Volts. And this accident was a t-bone similar to the crash test that caused all this controversy in the first place. But no Volt fires, anywhere.
Why can't anybody actually find a burning Volt someplace?
Additional article:
http://www.torquenews.com/1075/severe-chevy-volt-crash-screams-questio n-volt-really-incendiary
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Thought I would update this topic by pointing out that another whole year has passed without any Volts combusting.
There has in fact never been an EV-battery caused fire from any mainstream electric car in consumers hands, ever (a few press stories have suggested otherwise, but those fire incidents have all proven to have other causes.)
I made this point a year ago, and It's still true today, despite the existence of many more plug-in cars added to the road over the last year.
The same could never be said of gasoline, of course. Hundreds of thousands of gasoline-fueled auto fires occur every year.