Car Carrier Sinks After Pacific Deck Blaze

The Morning Midas had been adrift since June 3, when a fire forced crew to abandon the ship

The Morning Midas car carrier sank in the Pacific Ocean late Monday, weeks after a fire started on a deck that was carrying electric vehicles. The ship’s sinking leaves investigators with few clues to what caused the blaze.

The 600-foot-long ship had been adrift since June 3, when a fire broke out and forced the crew to abandon the vessel. London-based Zodiac Maritime, the ship’s owner, said fire damage, compounded by heavy weather, caused the ship to sink about 400 miles off the Alaska coast.

The Morning Midas was carrying 3,000 cars, including around 800 electric vehicles, Zodiac Maritime said. Most of the vehicles on the Morning Midas, including the EVs, were manufactured in China and bound for Mexico, The Wall Street Journal earlier reported.

The lithium batteries used in many electric vehicles are highly flammable. No ship fires have been directly blamed on EVs.

In 2022, a 60,000-ton cargo ship carrying thousands of luxury cars sank in the Atlantic Ocean after a fire burned for nearly a week.

Experts contracted to salvage the ship—the Panama-flagged Felicity Ace—said the presence of a large number of lithium-ion batteries likely caused the fire to spread and complicated efforts to extinguish it.

Insurer Allianz in a report last month warned of the dangers of shipping vehicles containing lithium-ion batteries, citing several fires and near misses in the maritime and logistics industries that were linked to batteries.

Morning Midas’s sinking in the Pacific—while transporting electric vehicles—underscores the complexities of modern sea freight, supply chain, and project logistics. It highlights the critical need for robust risk management and contingency planning in multi-modal, high-value cargo operations.

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