A spate of battery fires has rocked New York City this yr after they had been began by electrical bikes charging in tightly-packed condo buildings. So far, the fires have claimed 17 lives in 2023 after one other blaze killed three individuals this weekend.
The hearth on Sunday began within the Brooklyn neighborhood of Crown Heights, stories Heatmap. The blaze killed three generations of the identical household after it claimed the lives of Albertha West, right here son Michael West and grandson Jamiyl West. Heatmap stories:
It’s a narrative that has turn out to be all too frequent in New York City. According to FDNY Commissioner Laura Kavanagh, Sunday’s hearth brings the overall variety of individuals killed by battery fires to 17. Two hundred and thirty eight whole fires have been linked to the batteries, in accordance with officers. When produced underneath accepted requirements, lithium-ion batteries are secure, as The New YorkOccasions notes. But cheaply-produced, unregulated batteries for e-bikes and scooters are proliferating, significantly amongst supply employees.
“We owe it to the West family to do everything we can to make sure we do not lose one more New Yorker to these devices,” stated Kavanagh. “We are on track to surpass 100 fire deaths this year. That is an extraordinary number not seen in decades.”
This weekend’s battery hearth was the 238th blaze to be linked to electrical bikes thus far this yr, stories ABC 7 News. It’s been attributed to cheaply made electrical bike and scooter batteries, that are prone to “dangerous thermal runaway.” What’s extra, when the batteries ignite, they achieve this with explosive power with out smoldering, which might set off smoke alarms and alert anybody inside to the approaching blaze.
To try to stamp out fires similar to this, state and metropolis lawmakers have introduced in measures to make sure that solely secure, correctly examined e-bike and scooter batteries make it onto store flooring and into individuals’s properties. In New York, it’s now unlawful to promote, lease or hire bikes that don’t meet the right security requirements.
However, bikes that fall in need of issues like Underwriters Laboratories normal 2849 are nonetheless being utilized by individuals throughout the town. As ABC 7 News added:
“There is blood on the hands of this private industry- both the online retailers who continue to sell these illegal devices to this day— and the food delivery apps who continue to think that this problem will solve itself,” FDNY Commissioner Laura Kavanagh stated.
In order to try to get individuals off unsafe electrical bikes and onto extra tightly-regulated fashions, organizations have cropped up providing commerce in schemes for anybody nonetheless driving an unsafe e-bike. In New York, riders can work with The Equitable Commute Project to swap their unregulated fashions for one thing safer with particular pricing for supply employees and different individuals who depend on their e-bikes.
Source: jalopnik.com