Moment A Parked All-electric Tesla Model S Car Exploded In A Garage

Tesla is investigating a video on China’s Twitter-like social media, Weibo ,which showed a parked white Tesla Model S car exploding in Shanghai ,China.

The CCTV footage ,which was filmed yesterday at around 8.15p.m, started with the parked Tesla car emitting white smoke before bursting into flames seconds later.

Tesla said in a statement on Monday that:

“We immediately sent a team onsite and we’re supporting local authorities to establish the facts. From what we know now, no one was harmed”

There have been at least 14 instances of Tesla electric cars catching fire since 2013, with the majority occurring after a crash.

Tesla has previously said that petrol-powered cars are 10 times more likely to catch fire than those powered by electric batteries, based on its fleet of over 500,000 vehicles which have driven more than 10 billion miles.

The most popular hashtags on Weibo on Monday is “Tesla self-ignites“, racking up over 20 million clicks. Some users urged Tesla to quickly find the cause, whereas others speculated over the impact to the value of Tesla cars currently on the road.

A user also said “One lesson I learnt from the Shanghai self-exploding Tesla: Don’t park your car next to a Tesla”

The CCTV video comes as Tesla is preparing to unveil its “full self-driving” tech at a conference in Palo Alto, California, on Monday.