Visibility was minimal as firefighters battle the blaze in the Bronx on Sunday, March 5, 2023. Investigators said the fire was caused by a lithium-ion battery.
Photo Lloyd Mitchell
An e-bike is the suspected cause of one of four fires that left three people injured and required more than 280 total first responders in the Bronx on Monday, according to the FDNY.
Fire officials received the first call just before 6 a.m. on July 31 and responded to a basement fire at a four-story building located at 768 E. 187th St., near Southern Boulevard and Prospect Avenue in the Belmont section. According to the FDNY, it was an all hands response that warranted 12 units and 60 firefighters.
After the blaze was marked under control at 6:36 a.m., the FDNY requested the disposal of an e-bike at the building. According to the agency, one civilian suffered a minor injury and another suffered a serious but non-life threatening injury and was transported to St. Barnabas Hospital. The official cause of the inferno was still under investigation Tuesday evening.
E-bike fires are an all too familiar phenomenon in New York City. Earlier this summer, the FDNY attributed an apartment blaze in Concourse Village to an electronic lithium-ion battery — the kinds of batteries that power most e-bikes. That fire injured nine people in June.
That same month a fire also engulfed an e-bike shop in Manhattan’s Chinatown. The fire and thick smoke spread to apartments above the shop, killing four people and injuring three others, including a responding firefighter.
The e-battery fire issue — apart from perhaps the Twin Parks North West apartment fire in Fordham Heights that killed 17 people in January 2022 — has been central to various regulatory proposals and policies across New York City.
In two recent examples, Fordham University banned e-scooters, e-bikes and e-skateboards across university property citing fire danger last December, and state…
Read the full article here
Leave a Reply