Lithium-ion battery may have started small apartment fire in Salt Lake City

SALT LAKE CITY — An electric scooter may be to blame for a small apartment fire Monday morning in Salt Lake City. It's the fourth fire potentially involving lithium-ion batteries on the Wasatch Front in the last four months.

The apartment fire broke out at about 7:30 a.m. at a small building near 700 East and 1700 South. When firefighters arrived, they found heavy smoke and flames in the basement area of the building. Crews entered through an easily accessed window and quickly put the fire out.

The initial cause was deemed a lithium-ion scooter battery, but firefighters couldn't confirm if that was the exact cause. They're using it as an example to always be cautious around these batteries.

"If you have electric vehicles, electric scooters, electric — your cameras, and different things with these batteries. If they do start a fire, they can take off pretty rapidly, and it's a fairly difficult fire to fight," said Salt Lake City Fire Capt. Chad Jepperson.

That's exactly what happened in a recent Daybreak fire, which was likely caused by a lithium-ion battery. A video captured the flames erupting in the house.

The family had just bought the electric scooters, and they exploded. That same week, a battery was blamed for another Salt Lake City apartment fire back in February and a shed fire in Kearns.

Fortunately, everyone who was nearby Monday's fire evacuated safely. Firefighters saved the majority of the building and everyone's belongings inside. They are using this incident to remind people to be more aware of the potential fire dangers of things like e-bikes, scooters or hoverboards that have lithium-ion batteries.

Fire officials advised owners of electric vehicles to invest in high-quality batteries and chargers.

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