It just feels like somebody's looking for an excuse to go after Tesla. I read these articles about people leaping over concrete barriers and wrapping their car around a tree and just wonder "what the hell did you expect would happen?"
So 194,000 vehicle fires per year, or 18,602 within any given five week period.
Toyota's market share is 14.2%, so if the fires are evenly distributed, there would've been 2,641 vehicles of that brand catching fire. That's pretty close to 3,000.
Tesla isn't the victim of a smear campaign, this is fairly minor news that gets amplified in the HN/tech bubble.
Yes, quite improbable. It might break the engine, but there is nothing in the front of a car that would catch fire from such an impact.