After weeks of fire, the 183-meter-long car carrier Morning Midas has sunk in the Pacific, about 640 kilometers off the coast of Alaska. The ship had been adrift at sea since June 3.

The enormous ship had been adrift at sea since June 3 after a fire broke out on one of the vehicle decks. The crew abandoned the ship immediately after the fire broke out. The British shipping company Zodiac Maritime, which operates the Morning Midas, said that the combination of severe fire damage and heavy seas ultimately led to the ship’s sinking. No one was injured, and the crew was evacuated shortly after the incident.

Speculation about the cause of the fire

According to the shipping company, the Morning Midas was carrying 3,000 cars, including around 800 electric vehicles.

According to the Wall Street Journal, most of these vehicles were manufactured in China and were destined for the Mexican market. Although the exact cause of the fire remains unclear, experts are once again focusing their attention on lithium-ion batteries, as used in electric cars. These are considered highly flammable and often make it difficult to extinguish fires. There have been several cases in the past where a link between burning batteries and ship fires has been suspected, but this has never been conclusively proven.

A particularly sensational incident was the sinking of the Felicity Ace in the Atlantic in 2022. The freighter had thousands of luxury cars on board, including many electric vehicles. At the time, salvage specialists suspected that the batteries had contributed significantly to the rapid spread of the fire. With the sinking of the Morning Midas, many potential clues as to the cause of the fire have also been lost. The fact that the wreck is now in deep Pacific waters is hampering the investigation.

Credit: APA