Abroad
Crew abandons ship on fire with 3,000 vehicles, 800 of which are electric vehicles, off Alaska
EV fires are notoriously hard to put out.
June 06, 2025, 04:31 PM
A cargo ship carrying around 3,000 vehicles, including 800 electric vehicles, caught fire on Jun. 3 off the coast of Alaska.
The 22 crew members evacuated the Morning Midas, after they failed to put out the fire.
The ship's operator Zodiac Maritime confirmed the sequence of events in a statement to U.S. media on Jun. 4.
Zodiac said it was focusing on salvaging the vessel.
Left China for Mexico
The Liberia-flagged ship left China's Yantai port on May 26 and was on the way to Lazaro Cardenas, Mexico.
Smoke was initially seen rising from a deck loaded with EVs, the company said.
It is not clear what brand of vehicles the ship was carrying.
Evacuated to nearby vessel
The crew were evacuated via lifeboat and were transferred to a nearby merchant vessel in tandem with the U.S. Coast Guard.
The distressed vessel was located 482.8 km southwest of Adak in Alaska, the Coast Guard said on X.
EV-related fires hard to put out
EV-related fires on ships are challenging to extinguish due to the heat generated and risk of reignition.
Fires are known to last for days.
In 2022, a ship carrying 4,000 luxury cars, including Porsches and Bentleys, sank off the Portuguese Azores archipelago nearly two weeks after it caught fire.
Top photo via United States Coast Guard
