(Image: CHS)
Seattle Fire rushed to the scene and Seattle Police officers were collecting evidence including a red gas can ditched as a suspect ran from the scene after a Tesla was reportedly doused with gasoline and set on fire on 15th Ave E Thursday night.
The incident began unfolding around 8:15 PM as a 911 caller reported a male had thrown gas on the Tesla parked near 15th and Harrison and lit the vehicle on fire. As Seattle Fire arrived to handle the flames, SPD was pursuing two suspects reported fleeing on foot from the area wearing black clothing and face coverings.
This image of the singed car was posted to the CHS Facebook Group
According to East Precinct radio reports, witnesses reported the males fleeing on foot eastbound on Thomas. Police were able to track down one possible suspect after making a stop of a Metro bus but the male could not be immediately identified as a suspect by a witness. It is not clear if the male was released or remained in custody.
Police found a discarded red gas can and a white bag in front of nearby Overcast Coffee at 15th and John. Officers were also collecting video evidence from nearby businesses.
According to radio updates, the white 2022 Model S Tesla is registered to a Tacoma address.
There were no reported injuries.
15th Ave E was closed to traffic during the response. The vehicle was being towed with fire damage to its right side and front from the scene around 10 PM as the smell of smoke still hung in the air along the busy commercial district.
The reported intentional fire comes amid reports of incidents targeting Tesla cars and Cybertrucks across the country as backlash against company CEO Elon Musk and frustration around Department of Government Efficiency cuts to the federal government as the billionaire has become a trusted advisor during the second Trump administration. Earlier this week in Seattle, multiple Tesla Cybertrucks burned in an incident still under investigation.
UPDATE: According to police, they have security images of the suspect who lit the fire.
12th Ave apartment fire
Seattle Fire was also busy Thursday night with an apartment building near 12th and Denny. SFD was called to the address of the Heather Court Apartments just before 10 PM. SFD says the fire was quickly brought under control and contained to one unit in the 10-unit, 1950s-era building.
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Damn. Thoughts and prayers?
☕️👨💻Thank you! But I was only slightly inconvenienced. My car towed it self and reporter the incident to the police all while I was finishing my Americano.
🚬👱♂️📱(sure would have been nice if could have smoked inside while I watched it all happen. Oooh a shiny.)
So some liberal EV owner got their car torched. Big whoop.
Not the case AJ. He’s a conservative friend of mine. Don’t be a bonehead.
So do we want SPD to “be lazy” and”not do their jobs” or find the arsonist that torched personal property? Or will there be many decision tree options to justify one’s opinion?
I think it’s ok to be law and order and also laugh at this.
Anyway, what is everyone doing for the weekend?
Please not this, releasing toxic fumes into the air, creating unnecessary work for the fire department… Plenty of much better ways to protest DOGE and Musk than burning an already purchased Tesla!
This is the only thing to keep in mind – they’re nasty if they burn, so please please please make sure as many cops show up as possible to take big breaths if you’re gonna.
Yeah, screw the firefighters! Who cares!
The State certainly doesn’t, they’re off the hook if their civil servants die earlier than expected.
We still don’t know exactly what’s in those fumes and all the ways they impact health, but I’m not keen on the folks we outfit with guns and military equipment breathing fumes that in all likelihood will make them less rational and more aggressive with prolonged exposure.
More generally we can be against the institutions of policing and the actions of officers and programs, but actively working to harm them is only working against our cause and putting the well-being of your neighbors as potential collateral, the same thing were so upset about Musk and other wealthy doing. We need to be building up positive things and getting into the kind of “good trouble” that John Lewis and others spoke about.
“Do not get lost in a sea of despair. Be hopeful, be optimistic. Our struggle is not the struggle of a day, a week, a month, or a year, it is the struggle of a lifetime. Never, ever be afraid to make some noise and get in good trouble, necessary trouble.”
Maybe the car wasn’t actually on fire? Maybe it was just really autistic?
how terrible it would be if this type of property damage was more common as a form of political expression. just terrible!
We almost bought a Tesla about a year and a half ago, back with Musk started showing his true colors. We considered holding our noses and getting the car but made a different choice. Glad we didn’t support him.
I 100% get the justified anger towards Musk but I don’t agree with damaging people’s cars. It would be much more effective to set up shop outside the Tesla dealer and give future buyers second thoughts on what they are putting their money towards.
Agreed!
The good news is a lot of folks are doing just that too.
This is the correct answer.
Thanks, Rob. I think the vast majority of people would agree with you!
To be fair, Musk started showing his true colors in 2018 with the Thailand cave rescue when he called a rescue diver a “pedophile” and hired private investigators to discredit him when the diver refused his bizarre mini sub idea.
Before that, people chalked up Musk’s “weirdness” to him possibly being on the spectrum, but it became clear then that he was just another billionaire asshole that sees us all us poor, stupid morons for him to ridicule and control. Now he’s got our authoritarian minded president under his control.
Now he the illegal immigrant taking hundreds of thousands of American jobs the GOP has been warning us about. Like everything else the GOP has been warning us about since Nixon made dog whistling the official party anthem, it was a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Guys this is unacceptable, what would be totally okay would be breaking into the capitol building and killing cops.
wrong order…they had to kill the cops to get in.
we saved their lives for not. Schumer gave the purse away today
Yawn
Damaging people-owned Teslas allows Tesla to sell parts for repairs and can put money in their pockets.
The best way to complain about idiots in power breaking laws is definitely to turn Seattle into a lawless hellscape.
All the people I know who own Teslas are very progressive, and bought them way before the election. So in other words, it’s more than likely that the owner of this Tesla is a progressive. I can’t stand Musk, but think about it before damaging other peoples property.
Sell it?
Nope. I’m a retiree with a 6 year old tesla, and I cannot afford to sell at a huge loss and buy a comparable car to make a frankly impotent “statement” … I voted for KH and hate what is happening but torch away and hurt my finances further ..
If you are committing arson, you are the bad guy here. You can try to explain it away all you like, but you’re wrong, and it’s very, very simple.
Domestic terror back and forth is how Ireland got decades of The Troubles.
We aren’t there yet but we keep inching closer.
How will people react when you give Nazi salutes and get too cute trying to deny it, ban criticism or yourself on your free speech platform, and carelessly play with peoples’ livelihoods as the DOGE administrator? FAFO.
Welcome to the “Twilight Zone”, where simple cryptic re-arrangement of the letters within “TESLA” revealingly yields “STEAL” … a bellicose rallying cry for all dyslexic MAGA-nuts to earn their Orange Shirts: “STOP THE TESLA”!
Burning Teslas were reported to have become a significant problem in the recent LA area fires, as extinguishing Li-Ion battery fires is wishful thinking.
… how much lithium is in a Tesla battery? The answer varies depending on the model. Tesla primarily uses lithium-ion battery cells … the Tesla Model S Long Range is reported to contain approximately 350 kilograms of lithium.
https://www.acebattery.com/blogs/how-much-lithium-is-in-a-tesla-battery
No wonder that extinguishing (only) ONE Tesla brand vehicle fire requires something on the order of a swimming-pool size volume of water, which is then continuously applied for between 2 hrs to 12 hrs time by firefighters.
Can’t wait for Felon Musk’s upcoming “White Genocide” themed class-war battle-ready vehicles (I’ll take one with “Colonial Ketamine Camouflage”) – batteries included with your 5 Million$ Big Orange Daddy Gold Buddy Visa.