Fire at Rivian's Illinois factory damages several parked cars
08/25/2024 12:37 PM
A fire broke out at Rivian’s Illinois automotive factory over the weekend, and authorities are saying it was contained to the parking lot and only affected an undisclosed number of cars, rather than reaching the actual facility.
On Saturday evening, local news reports detailed a fire in the parking lot of Rivian’s factory in Normal, Illinois, with it spreading to an unspecified number of the company’s electric vehicles (EVs) in the parking lot. The vehicles were severely damaged in the fire, though the factory building itself was unaffected.
“We are investigating the cause of a fire that damaged a number of vehicles in a parking lot at our Normal plant late Saturday night,” a Rivian spokesperson told Teslarati. “The plant itself is unaffected. At this time, we are not aware of any injuries.”
The Normal Fire Department said it responded to the fire before 10:00 p.m. on Saturday, and crews remained on-site past midnight. One source who claimed to be an employee at the factory said this lot was for outbound vehicles and those that needed to be fixed before shipping.
At the time of writing, neither Rivian nor the Normal Fire Department have responded to Teslarati’s requests for additional information on the cause of the fire.
The incident was also captured on camera by Sergei Lebedev on Instagram, as later reposted by X user EVguyZach.
Uhh this is NOT good… This must have just happened….. #rivian#rivianfire
@ Rivian Normal IL Plant
Hopefully everyone is ok! pic.twitter.com/NsfACloz6o
— Zach (@EVguyZach) August 25, 2024
Last week, Rivian officially gained approval from the Normal Town Council to expand the facility, in order to help prepare for the production of the upcoming R2 platform. Although the upcoming platform was expected to be built at a new, upcoming factory in Georgia, construction of that plant has been put on hold and Rivian has moved R2 production to Illinois—garnering massive state incentives.
The electric vehicle (EV) maker also paused production of its Electric Delivery Vehicles (EDVs) at the factory, though it’s not currently clear how long production was halted for. The pause was reportedly due to a parts sortage, though it’s unclear for what part or parts.
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