Sunset Park Blaze Kills 6 As Lithium-ion Battery Fire Crisis Rages On
Six Brooklynites were killed in an early morning fire that engulfed an entire wooden row house — and authorities are investigating whether the blaze is linked to this year’s 41-percent rise in fires sparked or intensified by highly flammable lithium-ion batteries.
It took smoke-eaters three hours on Thursday to extinguish the 1:40 a.m. fire, which sent flames shooting out of every window. When the smoke cleared, four people were dead on the scene and two died later in the hospital. Four others remain hospitalized, officials said at a press briefing.
Fire marshals are still investigating, but early reports linked the fire to a lithium-ion battery, thought it is unclear if the battery sparked the blaze or was simply consumed by it. Two burnt-out electric bike frames were spotted outside the building on Thursday.
The Sunset Park incident comes weeks after a family of four was wiped out in the Bronx when an e-bike caught fire in their apartment.
The story behind the story
After a peak in deaths associated with the batteries in 2023, officials were quick to pass legislation banning the sale of uncertified lithium-ion batteries and e-bikes, but they are still easy to obtain online on sites like Facebook Marketplace. In addition, after-market modifications make batteries unstable.
Many batteries bought during the pandemic — when the delivery industry fueled by e-bikes boomed — are nearing the end of their useable life. The decay of lithium-ion batteries is one reason why there have been fewer deaths this year from fires, even as there have been more blazes, because more fires are occurring outside of homes when batteries are discarded.
Through mid-October, as Streetsblog reported exclusively, there were 87 lithium-ion fires in garbage trucks, up from 55 in all of last year, according to the Department of Sanitation.
“There’s no comprehensive plan to deal with the battery life cycles,” Baruch Herzfeld, who co-founded the battery charging company Popwheels, told Streetsblog last month. “There’s a fictitious belief that battery fires don’t happen unless batteries are charging. People are basing their safety guidelines on something that’s not true.”
The city’s efforts to promote outdoor battery storage and charging have largely fallen flat. After a successful pilot in 2024, the city has yet to install any public charging infrastructure and companies who provide battery subscription services are hindered by a web of ever-changing safety regulations that make it nearly impossible to grow. As of last month, the city hadn’t approved any permits that would allow landlords or business owners to set up charging cabinets on the sidewalk. The application will now be streamlined since New Yorkers overwhelmingly passed the mayor’s charter revision ballot proposals on Tuesday.
Sunset Park is filled with e-bikes — on the street, inside restaurants, within the gates of the many row houses, inside apartments. Elected officials want to see outdoor charging options.
“We have had multiple trainings from FDNY that ask people, do not store your battery inside, and also do not charge when you are sleeping. So that has been an ongoing issue,” said Council Member Susan Zhuang (D-Sunset Park) at the scene on Thursday. “I am going to look and see if we can set up some stations so people can just charge outdoors, that will be helpful to the community. It’s not just the delivery people that use the bikes, it’s everyone.”
A neighbor who has lived on the block for 42 years told Streetsblog she lives in fear of battery fires.
“I am angry as hell right now. We need control of these lithium batteries coming from China,” said Rukmin DeGaray. “They are no good for neighborhoods; they shouldn’t be allowed in any building that people live in. They just blow up and these old wooden buildings, they go up like lightning.”
