DO PRIUS TRACTION BATTERIES CATCH FIRE?

First, You have a NiMH battery in your 2010. No Prius used a Li-ion battery until 2012 and they were not common until 2016.

Li-ion batteries can fail in such a way that they go into thermal run away, they just get hotter and hotter, once they fail. Avoiding that is vital. The onboard computers need to be programmed to avoid, and detect thermal run away.

Lithium-ion battery - Wikipedia

Using Li-ion batteries in applications without thermal control have resulted in fires.

To the best of my knowledge, there are no Prius trucks.

Here are the reasons why so many hoverboards are catching fire - CNET

 

Supposing that the batteries are not manufactured by Samsung or you don't forget a Galaxy Note in your car, you should be fine.

 

it is possible, and has happened, but no more likely than the gasoline system. as to how to put it out, i would check with your local fire department.

 

• All batteries of course have electrical energy which can cause sparks and fires.
• Most Prius use NiMH batteries which do not sustain fire by themselves (not a fuel - they have water-based electrolyte).
• Lithium batteries (Prius Plug-ins and some other Prius models) have flammable organic electrolyte and so the battery itself can sustain a fire.

 

Prius NiMH batteries can have small explosions (sound like loud pops from the back) when a module has a hard failure.

 

Yes the traction battery can catch fire. However, in the study below, 4.4% of fatal crashes involved fire in conventional vehicles versus 2.6% in hybrids that involved fire. There was only a single case of a hybrid battery fire in the same study.

Read up more here.

https://www-esv.nhtsa.dot.gov/Proceedings/24/files/24ESV-000210.PDF

 

What fires would those be?

 

There have been some after crashes, most notably maybe, was one in the NHTSA crash labs years ago. Reaction has been a lot more fearful than from the thousands of gasoline fueled automobile fires.

 

The NHTSA test was a joke.
The Straight Story On the Chevy Volt Battery Fire

 

The Volt battery fires happened hours to days after intentional crash tests, not while driving.

The Prius fires I've heard about have been mostly in a certain section of the front, a long way from the battery. Your response should be the same as in any regular non-hybrid car -- pull over, park it, and get out. Don't try to put the fire out, there is too much gasoline hanging around for you to safely do that. Get away, call 911, and let the fire department handle it. Such fires happen hundreds of times per day in regular cars, so the FDs are well versed in how to handle them.

 

Common fire problems with Volt because bad battery location. Downstairs of rear passangers. In prius battary pack inside of saloon behind of rear seat. If it gonna be damaged during collision you not gonna be care about it because if it gonna be hit during battery damage you gonna be dead most likely. Needs tons of impact to reach the battery.

 

It can be reached if you're sitting at a red light and a bonehead in a 2000 Jeep Cherokee, going at least 60 mph, is more interested in his phone than what's going on out on the road and never even touches his brakes.

No fire, but he exploded the 12V battery and the fumes forced us out of the car even though the deputy told us to stay put. My wife and I both walked away from it, but she had some whiplash. Back of our '05 Prius was pretty much gone and the battery case was bent. I'm REALLY glad no one was in our back seat.

 

How about the plug-in Prii where the traction battery covers the whole cargo area?

 

I think they added some extra space in the Prime for rear crumple zone.