u/Rampage_Rick

Just saw it being loaded down the street from me.

According to the tow truck driver: Rear-ended, frame rail bent, totaled

Two coolers, two tents, air mattresses, tarps, camp stove, BBQ, fishing rods, electric kettle, and a small microwave (because why not?)

The report is out on the FreeWire battery-buffered DCFC that caught fire at a Chevron gas station in New Westminster, British Columbia, Canada in October 2025

https://youtu.be/wjt6xl9SfEc

https://vancouver.citynews.ca/2026/05/15/ev-charger-fire-caused-u-s/

https://www.technicalsafetybc.ca/regulatory-resources/incident-investigations/electrical-vehicle-charger-bursts-into-flames-while-in-diagnostic-mode-at-charging-station

Long story short, a remote technician put the unit in diagnostic mode (which bypassed a bunch of safety features) and accidentally turned on the battery heater. After baking for 26 hours the battery caught fire.

This is the second incident involving a FreeWire charger at a Chevron in BC. The first in 2024 involved an early model A2Z adapter that exploded while charging a Tesla: https://youtu.be/yj-auGkIRSs

https://driveteslacanada.ca/news/freewire-charger-not-third-party-adapter-responsible-explosion/

https://www.technicalsafetybc.ca/regulatory-resources/incident-investigations/owner-injured-by-arc-flash-while-using-an-EV-charger-adapter

Following the October fire, Chevron disabled all of the FreeWire stations and began removing them entirely (the fact that FreeWire is no longer in business probably contributed to this decision) They've since upgraded a few locations to ABB Terra fast chargers, but that rollout is moving slowly (and probably constrained by electrical grid limitations, as the whole selling point of the FreeWire units was the battery buffer feature that offset the need for huge electrical hookups)

While looking for the reports that I linked above, I found another report for one of the FreeWire units that caught fire in November after being uninstalled and sitting in storage since July 2025: https://www.technicalsafetybc.ca/regulatory-resources/incident-investigations/disconnected-electrical-vehicle-charger-in-storage-catches-fire

That was one of the units that came from the same location as the 2024 incident, which upgraded to the ABB Terra stations prior to the fire. The Hope BC location is probably their busiest location, and the battery-buffered FreeWire units were frequently empty or faulted out. I personally have experience visiting when 2 units were faulted out and the remaining 4 were operational but only at 11kW since the batteries were depleted. I was able to get a site attendant to reboot one of the faulted units via a tablet.

Also for the record, I love A2Z and own both a Typhoon Pro and Stellar Plug