Prabal Bordiya, a resident of Mumbai’s Mulund suburb, is distraught and frustrated. His 46-day old car, a petrol variant of the Tata Punch, went up in flames as he drove four other people, including a one-year-old child, through Gujarat’s Navsari district. There were no casualties, as his family quickly bailed out. The car, however, became a lost cause within minutes.
Boradiya told CNBC-TV18 he reached out to the Tata Roadside Assistance helpline, and was directed to file a First Information Report (FIR), and that the car could be towed only after verification of the incident by the police. Officials from the nearby Chikli police station, who responded to his call with fire extinguishers, have filed the FIR, but are awaiting the forensics report.
Tata Motors responded to a query from CNBC-TV18 on this incident saying, “We are actively looking into this thermal incident… We are engaging with the customer and investigating agencies to offer all possible support and will be conducting a detailed investigation to ascertain the facts/ reasons of this unfortunate incident.”
Boradiya confirmed that a Tata Motors showroom located near the accident spot has contacted him, and promised further assistance, including towing his vehicle to its workshop. But the incident has Boradiya rattled, since the Tata Punch is among only seven car models in India that boast a 5-star safety rating by Global New Car Assessment Programme (GNCAP) as of February 2023.
Previous Tata Motors fires
This is the first instance of a Tata Punch catching fire, the company says. However, it is not the company’s first brush with such incidents. More recently, in June 2022, a Tata Nexon EV caught fire. At the time, this was classified as a one-off incident – the first in over 30,000 EVs sold by the company by then.
At the time, the company said it was conducting a detailed investigation to ascertain the facts of the isolated thermal incident. The government had also ordered a probe into the incident.
However, Boradiya’s case involves an internal combustion engine, and so is not as common, given the spate of similar incidents involving electric vehicles of late.
ICE vs EV vs Hybrid: Which model has higher chances of catching fire?
Studies, however, say internal combustion engines, while naturally not immune to catching fire, are not outliers where such incidents are concerned. A 2022 study based on US government data showed that vehicles powered by petrol or gasoline are 10 times more prone to catching fire, than electric vehicles.
A separate study, which analysed data from three separate US government sources including the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) and the Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) showed that Electric Vehicles are the least likely to catch fire (25.1 fires for every 100,000 vehicles sold), followed by petrol vehicles (1,529 fires for every 100,000 vehicles sold). The most incidents of vehicular fires, interestingly, was found in hybrid vehicles (3,474 fires for every 100,000 vehicles sold).
The data also went on to suggest that while most recalls by EVs (due to fire hazard) stemmed from battery issues, fire hazard related recalls of vehicles powered by internal combustion engines stemmed from fuel leaks, electrical shorts, and a malfunction in the anti-lock braking systems (ABS).
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