Two EV Buses Catch Fire In London In Two Days

Written by The Daily Mail on January 12, 2024. Posted in Current News

A second London bus burst into flames this morning, completely destroying it just 24 hours after an electric double decker exploded on the school run

The hybrid vehicle was on fire this morning in North Woolwich, East London, with onlookers shouting ‘what the f***’ as they were urged to ‘move back, get back’.

A video showed the bus ablaze before dawn at the junction of Factory Road and Store Road, while later photographs taken in daylight showed its burnt-out shell.

Only yesterday, a huge blast ripped off the back of an Optare Metrodecker bus on route 200 in Wimbledon in South West London at 7.20am on its way to Raynes Park.

It came nearly two years after all Metrodeckers were temporarily taken out of service for safety checks in May 2022 when two were involved in a fire at Potters Bar bus garage in Hertfordshire – before being returned to service days later.

Today, a London Fire Brigade spokesman told MailOnline:

‘We were called at 6.49am today to reports of a bus on fire on Factory Road in North Woolwich.

No passengers were on the bus and there have been no reports of any injuries. Firefighters attended and brought the fire under control by 7.55am.

One double-decker bus was destroyed by fire. A 25-metre cordon is currently in place as a precaution. The cause of the fire is under investigation.’

Transport for London (TfL), which has about 1,000 electric buses across its network, said today that it will not withdraw any Metrodeckers and has insisted they are safe.

However the City Hall Conservatives have called on Mayor Sadiq Khan to remove all the buses from service until the cause of the Wimbledon blaze is known.

More than 80 Metrodecker buses operate on eight London routes around the capital – the others being the numbers 23, 28, 134, 295, 317, 626 and N28.

See more here dailymail.co.uk

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