The FIA has stated that sparking from the DS Penske FE car created the localised fire which halted testing indefinitely in Valencia.
The incident occurred on Tuesday afternoon localised to the garage of the battery supplier, WAE. FE had planned testing sessions at the Circuit Ricardo Tormo in Spain, however, it had been halted by the fire.
Resuming on Thursday afternoon, the FIA has now released new light on the incident, able to confirm it was due to a faulty battery.
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It occurred after the DS Penske of Robert Schwartzman came to a stop on track on Tuesday morning.
Stopping the opening session, the automatic battery safety system was triggered in the car which caused the car to stop.
It was then taken back to the pits where the battery was removed and taken to WAE.
The FIA said: “While being manually inspected by the battery single supplier team, there was an arc flash and some sparking, that resulted in a localised fire.”
Although in the WAE garage, it also caused harm to the Mahindra team’s garage. This meant the team were forced to run only one car for the rest of the test.
“None of the batteries present the same type of symptoms as the unit that failed.”
One person was also taken to hospital for checks before being released.
All batteries have been checked and none of the other batteries present the same symptoms as the unit that failed.
The FIA continued: “The investigations and findings provided by the single supplier of batteries for Formula E cars and reviewed by the FIA confirm that use of the battery packs in line with the single supplier’s recommendations and requirements are within acceptable safety tolerances for a motorsport environment and therefore acceptable for on-track activity to go ahead.
“The single supplier of batteries for Formula E cars has assessed available data for all batteries and confirmed that none of the batteries present the same type of symptoms as the unit that failed. The batteries are of the same specification as used in all twenty-two cars and sixteen races last season.”
“Additional safety measures have been introduced including reducing the power output to 300kW”
Despite losing the majority of the testing week, a four-and-a-half-hour session was held on Thursday. On Friday 10 hours of running is due to occur.
The FIA are keen to resume smooth running and are taking precautionary matters to avoid a similar incident.
They added: “In addition to the normal monitoring, and to mitigate risks, a series of additional safety measures have been introduced including reducing the power output to 300kW and investigating with immediate effect any potential issue or similar occurrence.”
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In the Thursday session, an FE simulation race took place which was topped by Robin Frijns of Envision Racing. This allowed teams to run procedures including attack mode, full course yellows and safety cars.
However, The FIA decided to avoid any other halting to sessions, the fast-charging pitstops were simulated.
This will affect teams as this is a new feature to this year which will see batteries topped up in pitstops.
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