Hyundai Recalling South Korean Kona EVs Over Fire Risk

Hyundai Motor Co. plans to issue a voluntary recall on Korean-market Kona Electrics as it addresses potential manufacturing defects it’s worried might result in short-circuiting battery cells. Roughly a dozen incidents of fire have been linked to the model, including isolated events in Australia and Canada, and the automaker is particularly keen to address them. Asia has come down hard on battery fires, following a string of high profile examples where battery electric vehicles burnt themselves to the ground.

South Korea’s Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport has already issued a release confirming Hyundai’s plan to recall 25,564 Kona EVs manufactured between September 2017 and March 2020. Those units will be inspected for defects before being issued obligatory software updates and a battery replacement, according to the government agency.

Read more
  • Sayahh I do not know how my car will respond to the trolley problem, but I will be held liable whatever it chooses to do or not do. When technology has reached Star Trek's Data's level of intelligence, I will trust it, so long as it has a moral/ethic/empathy chip/subroutine; I would not trust his brother Lore driving/controlling my car. Until then, I will drive it myself until I no longer can, at which time I will call a friend, a cab or a ride-share service.
  • Daniel J Cx-5 lol. It's why we have one. I love hybrids but the engine in the RAV4 is just loud and obnoxious when it fires up.
  • Oberkanone CX-5 diesel.
  • Oberkanone Autonomous cars are afraid of us.
  • Theflyersfan I always thought this gen XC90 could be compared to Mercedes' first-gen M-class. Everyone in every suburban family in every moderate-upper-class neighborhood got one and they were both a dumpster fire of quality. It's looking like Volvo finally worked out the quality issues, but that was a bad launch. And now I shall sound like every car site commenter over the last 25 years and say that Volvo all but killed their excellent line of wagons and replaced them with unreliable, overweight wagons on stilts just so some "I'll be famous on TikTok someday" mom won't be seen in a wagon or minivan dropping the rug rats off at school.