Lion Electric, the Quebec-based manufacturer of battery-electric school buses and Class 6 and 8 tractors who filed for bankruptcy last month, is finding itself in the hot seat once again following a fire incident involving ones of its buses in Huntsville, Ontario, Canada.
[Related: Lion Electric files for bankruptcy]
No one was injured and the fire's cause remains under investigation.
Per CTV News, the student-packed bus was on its way to school this past Monday morning when it began to malfunction in an unspecified way. There were no signs of a fire at the time. The driver safely pulled to the side of the road and requested a replacement bus to pick up the students and take them to school.
The Huntsville/Lake of Bays Fire Department was notified about the stranded bus at around 8:30 a.m. Upon arrival shortly thereafter, however, the bus was engulfed in flames.
“The school bus had broken down prior to the fire starting. The driver of the bus had called for a replacement bus, which picked up the passengers shortly before the flames became visible,” said Grant Murchison, Huntsville/Lake of Bays Fire Department’s fire prevention officer.
The fire's cause has yet to be determined but Murchison is not immediately blaming the battery. The Office of the Fire Marshall has been tasked with the investigation.
Lion Electric could not be reached for comment.
Lion's EV school bus was previously built at its now-shuttered 900,000 square-foot Joliet, Il. factory, about 50 miles from Chicago. The factory opened to much fanfare in July 2023 and was the largest U.S.-based facility dedicated entirely all-electric medium- and heavy-duty vehicle manufacturing. It was designed to produce around 20,000 vehicles annually. Production was suspended last December
[Related: Lion Electric suspends Illinois plant production, lays off hundreds]
Illinois Gov J.B. Pritzker was present for the facility's opening ceremony, stating at the time that it was going to "put Illinois at the forefront of a national movement to transition to zero-emission vehicle use, advancing our own goals of putting one million of these cars on the road by 2030."
[Related: Illinois Gov 'disappointed' in struggling Lion Electric, blames Trump]
To date, the Quebec government has invested roughly $177 million CAD into Lion while Ottawa provided another $30 million CAD. Pritzker confirmed that Lion has not received any state funds and this will obviously remain unchanged.
