- A C8 Corvette Stingray caught fire mid-drive on a highway.
- Video shows a muffled bang from the rear before flames appear.
- This model was not part of the previous fire risk recall.
Picture this: you’re driving a Chevy Corvette Stingray with your favorite music blaring, and the roof down, enjoying your time behind the wheel of what is one of the best performance deals money can buy. Suddenly, there’s an explosion in the engine bay, and the car catches fire. Sounds like a nightmare, right? For one C8 driver, this is exactly what happened.
Footage of the incident recently surfaced on Reddit, offering a firsthand view of the fire as it unfolded. Filmed from the driver’s Ray-Ban Meta glasses, the clip shows him cruising at around 80 mph (129 km/h) before slowing to 60 mph (97 km/h) as the road curves to the left. At this moment, a small, muffled explosion can be heard from the engine bay.
Read: GM Found A Fix For Corvette Fire Risk But Owners Still Have To Wait
The driver immediately looks in the rear-view mirror, and flames can be seen bursting out from behind. He quickly pulls over onto the shoulder, puts the car into Park, and quickly jumps out, seemingly without turning off the engine.
As he pivots toward the rear, the fire is already well underway. Flames consume the back of the car in seconds. Acting fast, the driver grabs a few items from the passenger seat and bolts away from the growing blaze.
Video Reddit
So, what exactly went wrong here? Last year, Chevrolet issued a stop-sale on specific new Corvettes and recalled over 23,000 vehicles deemed vulnerable to catching fire during refueling. But that recall only affected models equipped with the flat-plane crank V8, namely, the Z06 and ZR1. This particular Stingray wasn’t one of them.
Some have speculated that there was a fuel leak in the engine, spilling onto the hot exhaust. While this is certainly possible, it doesn’t explain why there appears to have been a small explosion from the rear.
Regardless of the root cause, let’s hope the Corvette driver’s insurance policy is as solid as the car once was.
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