Fire in Sherbrooke building may have been caused by an electric bicycle
Posted June 26, 2023 12:41 pm.
Last Updated June 26, 2023 12:50 pm.
SHERBROOKE, Qc – An investigation is underway to determine whether Monday morning’s fire in an eight-unit apartment building in Sherbrooke was caused by the exploding battery of an electric bicycle.
No one was injured, but the fire caused extensive damage to the building on des Boisés Street in the south of the city.
In an interview with Réseau de l’information, Sherbrooke Fire Department Division Chief Martin Primeau said that residents of the four-storey building had informed firefighters of the bicycle explosion shortly before the fire broke out, at around 8:30 a.m. He said that this hypothesis would be examined by the investigators.
Three alarms were sounded to extinguish the flames.
A city bus was dispatched to provide temporary shelter, and volunteers from the Canadian Red Cross were on hand to help.
Faced with a growing number of fires caused by lithium-ion batteries used in electric mobility devices, Health Canada issued an advisory on May 11.
In this advisory, which contains several recommendations, Health Canada wrote that the lithium-ion batteries in these bicycles can undergo thermal runaway. This phenomenon occurs when excessive heat builds up in the battery due to damage, failure or misuse.
This excessive heat, combined with the battery’s highly flammable contents, can lead to explosions or fires that are extremely difficult to extinguish, according to Health Canada.
The federal department added that it is important to recharge and store lithium-ion batteries safely, and to replace them only with parts from the original manufacturer. It is also important never to modify or tamper with a lithium-ion battery, or attempt to manufacture one, as this could result in short circuits, overheating, fires or explosions.
Health Canada added that in the United States, between January 1, 2021 and last November 28, authorities received reports from 39 different states of at least 208 fires or overheating incidents related to electric mobility.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published in French on June 26, 2023.
