GAUTENG. – Firefighters have been called out for the second time this week to a fire caused by lithium-ion batteries in Johannesburg, after a blaze broke out in the basement of a shop in the city centre. More than 300 portable battery power stations were found in a closed storage room, where some of the damaged batteries caught fire again.
According to Fireblock, which assisted at the request of the Johannesburg Fire Department, visibility in the basement was almost zero due to thick smoke. Firefighters had to open several closed storage rooms to locate the source of the fire. While the power stations were being removed from the basement, a thermal camera was used to detect hot spots. The damaged batteries were treated with Fireblock lithium gel to cool them down, and the batteries that were removed from the basement were handed over to Salvage Solar for further handling.
This article is an automatic English translation of a Nuusflits article originally published in Afrikaans. Read the Afrikaans original.
