# Flooding



## bulls96 (Aug 16, 2018)

I am in an area with high likelihood of heavy rain from Hurricane Florence.

I am wondering what your experiences are driving thru flooded areas not the crazy waist deep floods but maybe more common half wheel height flooding.

In an ICE, driving thru flooded areas is accomplished as long as you keep the pedal on the gas to not let water in thru the exhaust pipes.

Our cars have batteries as floors, I wonder what are the guidelines out there in terms of driving thru mildly flooded areas.

THanks.​


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## SoFlaModel3 (Apr 15, 2017)

First and foremost, please stay safe!!

There is a video floating around of a Model S driving through a flooded tunnel while cars all around are stalled out. 

I don’t know if we’ve seen anything on Model 3 like that yet though.


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## MelindaV (Apr 2, 2016)

Im sure it goes without saying, but water can wash away a car - even fairly shallow water, so don't drive thru flooded areas if you can at all avoid it. Not just to avoid potential damage, but more importantly, injury


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## garsh (Apr 4, 2016)

bulls96 said:


> In an ICE, driving thru flooded areas is accomplished as long as you keep the pedal on the gas to not let water in thru the exhaust pipes.



FYI, for older vehicles where the radiator fan is driven directly by the motor (I believe all modern cars use electric fans), you have to be careful not to rev the motor too high, or the fan blades will bend from hitting the water.


> Our cars have batteries as floors, I wonder what are the guidelines out there in terms of driving thru mildly flooded areas.


Avoid it if possible. Those battery packs sealed, so they can withstand all sorts of splashing. But they're not sealed well enough to keep out water long-term if they're below the water line. Rich Rebuilds is trying to rebuild a Model S that was totaled from flooding. It had been sitting in water for a few days. The battery pack was shot. It's not good for the long-term survival of the car.

Now, if you *need* to drive through a flooded area for your own safety, and the car's long-term prospects are no longer your concern, then @SoFlaModel3 is correct. A Tesla can drive through flooded areas quite well. Note that it will still float, despite the heavy weight, so be careful not to go through anything too deep, or the car will be carried away, as @MelindaV says.​

__ https://twitter.com/i/web/status/744551674082136066


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## ssc8666 (Aug 4, 2018)

I won't risk it either. If I recall, there were couple of reports not too long ago that rear bumper fell off when driving in somewhat heavy rain. However, not sure if these are FUDs though.


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## garsh (Apr 4, 2016)

ssc8666 said:


> I won't risk it either. If I recall, there were couple of reports not too long ago that rear bumper fell off when driving in somewhat heavy rain. However, not sure if these are FUDs though.


Yeah, that was a strange one. I haven't heard of any additional cases since those first two.

I'm guessing the "bumper-bot" got replaced by a reliable human soon afterwards.


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