Lithium-ion battery may have been to blame for Arlington Heights, Illinois garbage truck explosion
The Arlington Heights, Illinois Fire Department on Tuesday released its final report on a garbage truck explosion that injured two police officers and a firefighter back in December.
Fire officials believe the improper disposal of a lithium-ion battery may have been to blame.
"We can't prove it, but there's a very high suspicion that this fire was started because of improper of a lithium-ion battery in a recycling bag," Arlington Heights Fire Chief Lance Harris said Tuesday. "The amount of fire and the amount of heat that we had that day indicates that it was a lithium-ion battery, because when a lithium-ion battery goes into thermal runaway, it's burning at around 750 degrees."
The blast happened on the afternoon of Friday, Dec. 6, and also caused significant property damage.
Police said officers and firefighters responded to reports of a garbage truck fire on Derbyshire Avenue just north of Euclid Avenue around 4 p.m. that day, and as they were arriving on the scene, part of the truck exploded.
The truck was operated by Groot Waste Management and was powered by compressed natural gas, and police believe one of the compressed natural gas tanks exploded.
Arlington Heights police body cam video shows white smoke coming from the garbage truck as a firefighter attaches a hose to a fire hydrant several feet away. Suddenly, the garbage truck detonates like a bomb.
The explosion sent a fireball and a plume of thick gray smoke into the air. Debris rained down into the street and landed on nearby homes.
In the time since the explosion, the firefighter and police officers who were injured have recovered.
