The National Transportation Safety Board will send a technician to observe Tesla’s examination of one of its cars that inexplicably burst into flames while it was being driven in West Hollywood, the federal agency announced Monday.
“The observation will provide the agency with an opportunity to learn more about fires in all types of battery-powered vehicles,” according to a statement from the agency.
According to the NTSB, Tesla officials provided the agency with information about the fire after it was reported Friday in West Hollywood, and the NTSB will send “one technical specialist to observe Tesla’s examination of the vehicle.”
The electric car, a Tesla Model S, was being driven on Santa Monica Boulevard in West Hollywood by filmmaker Michael Morris, husband of “West Wing” actress Mary McCormack. McCormack posted a video of the fire on her Twitter account, saying her husband had no idea his car was burning until witnesses alerted him.
“This is what happened to my husband and his car today,” McCormack wrote in the post. “No accident, out of the blue, in traffic on Santa Monica Blvd. Thank you to the kind couple who flagged him down and told him to pull over. And thank god my three little girls weren’t in the car with him.”
Tesla issued a statement to various media outlets calling the fire “an extraordinarily unusual occurrence, and we are investigating the incident to find out what happened.”
“Our initial investigation shows that the cabin of the vehicle was totally unaffected by the fire due to our battery architecture, which is designed to protect the cabin in the very rare event that a battery fire occurs. While our customer had time to safely exit the car, we are working to understand the cause of the fire. We’re glad our customer is safe.”
