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23 June 2023
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Four dead after battery causes fire at New York City e-bike shop that spreads to apartments, US
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A fire at a New York City e-bike shop quickly spread to upper-floor apartments and killed four people early Tuesday, 20 June 2023, leaving two other people in critical condition. A fire fighter suffered minor injuries. The fire began on the first floor of a building at 80 Madison Street shortly after midnight, the latest deadly fire linked to exploding lithium ion batteries. The three-alarm fire quickly spread through the business.
About 140 fire fighters and emergency personnel came to the six-storey building, which includes residential apartments above the ground floor.
Six adults were taken to three area hospitals, where four of them, two women, 62 and 65 years old and two men, 71 and 80, died. The other two, both women, were in critical condition, the police said.
Tuesday morning’s fire, which was deemed accidental, was caused by a lithium-ion battery on the first floor, according to officials. The aftermath left soot smeared above the broken-out windows of the building, which also houses a deli, a laundromat and a news stand.
The fire started at a shop that was cited last summer for safety violations related to the storage and charging of batteries, officials said. Investigators determined that it was an accident caused by a lithium ion battery, which can overheat while being charged and explode in an intensely hot flare of flame, fire officials said.
A pile of burned bikes, scooters and other debris lay on the sidewalk outside the shop, HQ E-Bike Repair, which was on the ground floor of a six-storey building in Manhattan’s Chinatown neighbourhood.
So far this year, there have been more than 100 fires and 13 deaths linked to battery explosions in the city, said Fire Commissioner Laura Kavanagh. “There was a very large number of both batteries and e-bikes,” Kavanagh said at a morning news conference. “This location is known to the fire department. We have written violations at this location before and we have conducted enforcement at this location before. So we would like to really emphasise today something that we have been saying over and over ... it is also very, very important to get the word out how incredibly dangerous this is,” Kavanagh said. “This exact scenario where there’s an e-bike store on the first floor and residences above and the volume of fire created by these lithium ion batteries is incredibly deadly.”
Lithium ion batteries can catch fire because they contain a flammable electrolyte solution that allows electrical current to flow, experts say. Many fires have been linked to such batteries in laptops, cellphones and other items.
Chief Fire Marshal Daniel Flynn said the shop was inspected last August and later cited for safety violations related to battery charging, the number of batteries at the site and the electrical system. The shop was fined $1 600. Authorities recently surveilled the store and found there were many batteries there but none of them were being charged at the time, he said.
A man who said he was the owner of the bike shop said that he made his usual checks of the store before he left Monday night. He denied that any e-bike batteries were being charged. “The shop has been there for six years. I check before I leave every night,” said the man, who spoke in Mandarin in a phone interview and only gave his last name, Liu. “I checked last night, turned off the power besides the ones for the monitor and automatic door.”
He added, “I got a call from a neighbour ... and told me about the fire. I went to my shop but couldn’t get close when they were working on the fire. I saw a lot of smoke. My shop is gone. I’ve been working for nothing for years.” Liu said he was at the police station waiting to talk with officers Tuesday morning.
The fire startled the neighbourhood in the middle of the night. “A friend of mine came in and yelled ’there’s a fire next door,’” neighbourhood resident Belal Alayah told WABC-TV. “I step out. I see the flames so hot it’s going through the metal gate. I knew it was the bike store, so I called the fire department. But the fire kept getting bigger and bigger and it took them a while to stop the fire.”
Electric bikes have become popular, non-gasoline-powered ways to make deliveries, commute and zip around a city that has promoted cycling in recent decades. Many run on lithium ion batteries, which have been blamed for numerous fires.
Last month, an e-bike battery caused a blaze at an apartment building in the Washington Heights section of Manhattan, killing four people including a 94-year-old woman, officials said. In April in the Queens section, two children were killed in a fire blamed on an e-bike battery. Another Manhattan fire in November that injured more than three dozen people was caused by a malfunctioning e-bike battery, officials said.
Sources: NYPD, The Associated Press, The New York Times
About 140 fire fighters and emergency personnel came to the six-storey building, which includes residential apartments above the ground floor.
Six adults were taken to three area hospitals, where four of them, two women, 62 and 65 years old and two men, 71 and 80, died. The other two, both women, were in critical condition, the police said.
Tuesday morning’s fire, which was deemed accidental, was caused by a lithium-ion battery on the first floor, according to officials. The aftermath left soot smeared above the broken-out windows of the building, which also houses a deli, a laundromat and a news stand.
The fire started at a shop that was cited last summer for safety violations related to the storage and charging of batteries, officials said. Investigators determined that it was an accident caused by a lithium ion battery, which can overheat while being charged and explode in an intensely hot flare of flame, fire officials said.
A pile of burned bikes, scooters and other debris lay on the sidewalk outside the shop, HQ E-Bike Repair, which was on the ground floor of a six-storey building in Manhattan’s Chinatown neighbourhood.
So far this year, there have been more than 100 fires and 13 deaths linked to battery explosions in the city, said Fire Commissioner Laura Kavanagh. “There was a very large number of both batteries and e-bikes,” Kavanagh said at a morning news conference. “This location is known to the fire department. We have written violations at this location before and we have conducted enforcement at this location before. So we would like to really emphasise today something that we have been saying over and over ... it is also very, very important to get the word out how incredibly dangerous this is,” Kavanagh said. “This exact scenario where there’s an e-bike store on the first floor and residences above and the volume of fire created by these lithium ion batteries is incredibly deadly.”
Lithium ion batteries can catch fire because they contain a flammable electrolyte solution that allows electrical current to flow, experts say. Many fires have been linked to such batteries in laptops, cellphones and other items.
Chief Fire Marshal Daniel Flynn said the shop was inspected last August and later cited for safety violations related to battery charging, the number of batteries at the site and the electrical system. The shop was fined $1 600. Authorities recently surveilled the store and found there were many batteries there but none of them were being charged at the time, he said.
A man who said he was the owner of the bike shop said that he made his usual checks of the store before he left Monday night. He denied that any e-bike batteries were being charged. “The shop has been there for six years. I check before I leave every night,” said the man, who spoke in Mandarin in a phone interview and only gave his last name, Liu. “I checked last night, turned off the power besides the ones for the monitor and automatic door.”
He added, “I got a call from a neighbour ... and told me about the fire. I went to my shop but couldn’t get close when they were working on the fire. I saw a lot of smoke. My shop is gone. I’ve been working for nothing for years.” Liu said he was at the police station waiting to talk with officers Tuesday morning.
The fire startled the neighbourhood in the middle of the night. “A friend of mine came in and yelled ’there’s a fire next door,’” neighbourhood resident Belal Alayah told WABC-TV. “I step out. I see the flames so hot it’s going through the metal gate. I knew it was the bike store, so I called the fire department. But the fire kept getting bigger and bigger and it took them a while to stop the fire.”
Electric bikes have become popular, non-gasoline-powered ways to make deliveries, commute and zip around a city that has promoted cycling in recent decades. Many run on lithium ion batteries, which have been blamed for numerous fires.
Last month, an e-bike battery caused a blaze at an apartment building in the Washington Heights section of Manhattan, killing four people including a 94-year-old woman, officials said. In April in the Queens section, two children were killed in a fire blamed on an e-bike battery. Another Manhattan fire in November that injured more than three dozen people was caused by a malfunctioning e-bike battery, officials said.
Sources: NYPD, The Associated Press, The New York Times