By Jo Nova
All flights are currently suspended at Luton Airport, London after a major fire broke out last night at 9pm. No one at the BBC, apparently, can explain why it spread so fast (the mystery!). But everyone is grateful this was not an underground carpark below, say, a 20 story apartment building with babies sleeping upstairs, especially since part of the top floor of the carpark has collapsed.
The fire has, unfortunately demolished some dreams of carbon reduction.
UPDATE: Apparently the word is that it was a diesel car that started the fire. The question is then, if there were no EV’s on that floor, would it have spread just as fast, would the floor have collapsed, and would cars have exploded like popcorn in the microwave? Awaiting the BBC gurus…
Looks like the whole car park has just fallen down through the flames!#LutonAirport #luton #Airport #fire #flights #suspended pic.twitter.com/fods2ygv9T
— Yasin Sandhu (@CHSandhu886) October 10, 2023
Hear the sound of cars exploding:
So you’re not allowed to send a lithium battery through the post unless it’s in a fire-proof, blast-proof package but you can park your #Tesla in a multi-story car park next to very expensive, well-made cars.
Explain that one to me again.#lutonairport pic.twitter.com/E06Ys6KoM8
— 🌊 Paul Downes 🇺🇦🌐 (@CallmeDownsie) October 11, 2023
Luton Airport flights suspended after large car park fire
By Greg McKenzie and Emily McGarvey, BBC News
All flights at London Luton Airport have been suspended and people have been asked not to travel there because of a large fire in a terminal car park.
The Terminal Car Park 2 suffered a “significant structural collapse”, Bedfordshire Fire Service says. Up to 1,200 vehicles may have been in the car park and subsequently damaged, the fire service said. Four firefighters and a member of airport staff were taken to hospital for smoke inhalation.
Russell Taylor, 41, an account director from Kinross, saw the flames after flying in to London Luton from Edinburgh. He told the PA news agency: “There were a couple of fire engines with a car ablaze on the upper floor of the car park at just after 9pm. “A few minutes later most of the upper floor was alight, car alarms were going off with loud explosions from cars going up in flames.”
h/t GaryS
UPDATE #2: Allegedly there were no sprinklers (which wouldn’t put out an EV battery fire anyway). Let’s try to imagine what kind of sprinkler system would contain those EV Fires — like drop-down glass-fibre spray that solidifies on contact or like jet sprayed asbestos?
UPDATE #3: As many as 1,500 cars were in the car park, it’s not clear how many survived. Fireman say all four floors pancaked in at least one part. *See the video of the supposed start of the fire. And footage where the car is visible. Seems like a very big explosion. Some are saying it was a hybrid diesel.
Let your imagination run …