A cargo ship carrying electric vehicles and highly flammable lithium-ion batteries caught fire off Alaska’s coast late Wednesday, the US Coast Guard said.
The crew sent a distress alert 15 minutes after smoking started on a deck carrying electric vehicles on Tuesday afternoon, when the ship was roughly 1,200 miles from Anchorage.
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The 22 crew members were rescued by a nearby commercial vessel after leaving the 600-foot ship, the Morning Midas, on a lifeboat.
The Coast Guard said it would allow the fire to burn out due to the high risk of explosion because of the presence of lithium-ion batteries.
Lithium-ion batteries can overheat, causing rapidly spreading fires and toxic gases that are both dangerous and difficult to extinguish.
