GM Inside News Forum banner

Florida airport fire destroyed more than 3,500 rental cars

7K views 46 replies 23 participants last post by  CJH 
#1 ·
https://www.ctvnews.ca/world/a-fire...stroyed-more-than-3-500-rental-cars-1.4884117

A fire that spread through a grassy area of Southwest Florida International Airport has destroyed thousands of rental cars, fire department officials said.
The blaze began Friday, spanned 15 acres and originally involved only 20 cars in the grassy rental car overflow area at the airport in Fort Myers, fire department officials said.
But by the time it was extinguished, the flames had destroyed more than 3,500 rental cars, a Lee County Port Authority spokesperson told CNN affiliate WINK.

Melinda Avni, Mitigation Specialist for Florida Forestry Service of Caloosahatchee, said authorities were called to put out the fire around 5 p.m. Friday, when there were about 20 vehicles involved.
"By the time we had units on the scene, we had 100 cars (on fire). We lost count after the hundreds," she said.
Black clouds of smoke could be seen for miles around Fort Myers, a city of about 82,000 people in southwest Florida. Ground and aerial support was provided by Florida Forestry Service and multiple fire departments, Avni said.
At least 80 airdrops were made by the Charlotte County Sheriff's Office's aviation unit, it said in a Facebook post.
The forestry service deemed the blaze contained by 10:30 a.m. Saturday, nearly 18 hours after it began, Avni said.
The brush surrounding the overflow area caught fire and help its quick spread, but no structures at the airport were affected, Avni said. No injuries were reported and the cause of the fire is under investigation, she said.
 
See less See more
#4 ·
Re: A fire at a Florida airport destroyed more than 3,500 rental cars

With the downturn in tourism here the airports are parking tons of their rentals in fields. It was only a matter of time until this happened.
 
#6 ·
Re: A fire at a Florida airport destroyed more than 3,500 rental cars

With the downturn in tourism here the airports are parking tons of their rentals in fields. It was only a matter of time until this happened.
It's more than tourism................... air travel in-total is down almost 95%.


If you don't fly to a different city, you don't land in a different city, if you don't land in a different city, you aren't in that different city to need a car.
 
#8 ·
Re: A fire at a Florida airport destroyed more than 3,500 rental cars

Unfortunate, but if one watches the video of this, pretty unsurprising as this wasn't exactly a manicured lawn they were parking these things on. I believe most GM cars have some pretty fun illustrations of this in the owner's manuals, perhaps not as good as the "don't wear your seat belt like this" ones. Some of them are things I wouldn't have come up with without the pictures. I'm sure all car manuals warn you of the fire danger from parking on dry grass or leaves.

I'm sure they had a ton of rental cars there when things started to shut down, too. Not much place to send them or reason to move them anywhere, either, with all the uncertainty. Ft. Myers is the Spring Training home of the Minnesota Twins, and the shutdowns must have crushed all the tourist places and restaurants there. I know here in Phoenix we're in the same boat with Spring Training. I know a lot of places pay the bills for the year with March and April. Not too many people come here in the summer, so it'll be dead once things reopen. People won't start travelling for awhile, so I suppose in a way it's good not many would be coming here anyway. This was the worst possible time for the tourist stuff to shutdown for Phoenix, though.
 
#10 · (Edited)
Re: A fire at a Florida airport destroyed more than 3,500 rental cars

We are already in a "Restricted Fire Zone" meaning No "Open Fires" not even for Cooking for Warmth. And 70+% of our woods are still snow covered, all are soggy. The MNR (Ministry of Natural Resources) are worried about the lack of Man Power to fight the annual Grass Fire season. As Farmers and Land Owners burn fields and such that get out of control.

This looks like a Simple "Lack of Common Sense" to Water the Parking Grounds before Parking Vehicles on Dry Grass.

That Will trickle down to a "Recall" of "Fire Risks due to Antifreeze Leak causing an Over Heating problem, and if driven long enough with Warning Lights and Chimes on, could cause the Motor Oil and Debris on the Engine to Ignite"

The only thing with 3500 involved, How to tell Which Vehicle Line to Recall?
 
#11 ·
#14 ·
Someone didnt slash the grass! The cats get super hot, and when a car parks on long grass..............
 
  • Like
Reactions: eklauss
#15 · (Edited)
Huge variety of cars in there surprisingly, lots of Chevy Malibus, Impalas, and Chrysler 300s in particular. But I also spotted Mustang convertibles, Kias, Hyundais, Nissans, Chrysler minivans, etc. Overwhelmingly sedans, a few recognizable utilities like a Traverse, Blazer, and Edge (the only three that are easily identifiable to me anyway). I know the sedan market is almost entirely propped up by non-retail at this point so it makes sense to see acres of them here.
 
#18 ·
Peak winter car rental season ends in Florida around the third week of March. Big fields of cars like these are common at airports and Theme Park rental locations throughout Florida from March to May as the rental companies shift fleets north to meet demands in tourist areas for the summer season. The process reverses in the late summer. Rental rates are as cheap as $5 a day to drive a car north in the spring and south in the fall to aide in this migration of "snowbird" rental cars.
 
#19 ·
Easter is a little later this year, "Spring Break" is this week or next week for most K-12 children, people from the North, would normally be flocking to Florida and other warm places, but this year is far from normal.

I suspect rental car utilization is about 2 or 3 percent, cars are just sitting everywhere, with no urgent need to move them; there isn't any demand anywhere in the country.
 
#38 ·
On the plus side of this, here's your answer to the question of "how do I reliably disinfect my car regarding CV19?"
 
  • Like
Reactions: gkr778
#39 ·
Tsk Tsk Tsk ... you must learn to never argue rental fleet numbers with Ed like I did many moons ago :)

One point to make though is the rate/volume part versus percentage. The Camry at 20% of 350K sales is 70K units. The Malibu at 43% of 170K units is 70K units. So yes, there are a lot of both in the rental fleets, but I'd generally say based on renting around the US that Camry's are packed into west coast locations and Newark, NJ (for some odd reason) and Malibu's are rare except in Portland in the west and pretty heavy in the midwest and east.
 
  • Like
Reactions: richmond2000
#41 ·
Tsk Tsk Tsk ... you must learn to never argue rental fleet numbers with Ed like I did many moons ago :)
I'll take that as a compliment, but who was arguing?


One point to make though is the rate/volume part versus percentage. The Camry at 20% of 350K sales is 70K units. The Malibu at 43% of 170K units is 70K units. So yes, there are a lot of both in the rental fleets, but I'd generally say based on renting around the US that Camry's are packed into west coast locations and Newark, NJ (for some odd reason) and Malibu's are rare except in Portland in the west and pretty heavy in the midwest and east.
You would be correct, except Camry is only 16%. :)

I have access to registration data by state, by registration type too, but I'm not sure how accurate that would be, seems like so many cars have different state plates.



Also worth noting that today's daily rental models are now pretty much retail models with a generous fleet discount,
not the stripped models of old or the superseded Classics and Limited's of more recent times. A bit of fleet sales
is good business provided that it doesn't hurt residual values and the need for higher incentives to push retail sales.
GM does has "FL" models, 1FL, 2FL so there are dedicated fleet models, just not total base model strippers.

Something new, as in the last 5 or so years at least, Dealership Courtesy Cars, continually rotating out loaners, and selling them at a significant discount.

The Chevy Group near me, has a sticker in the window, telling the loaner, once you hit 2,500 miles, come-back and we'll get you another car, that must be the magic number for GM.
 
#40 ·
Also worth noting that today's daily rental models are now pretty much retail models with a generous fleet discount,
not the stripped models of old or the superseded Classics and Limited's of more recent times. A bit of fleet sales
is good business provided that it doesn't hurt residual values and the need for higher incentives to push retail sales.
 
#44 ·
Sounds like they need to burn more cars..................

Hertz Global shares are trading lower following a report suggesting the company could be filing for bankruptcy sometime this week.

I also caught a comment on CNBC, that rental companies don't need to order ANY cars, the rest of the year; that hits some OEM's worse than others.
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top