A Tesla Semi caught fire on southbound Interstate 880 in Hayward, California, at about 5:35 p.m. Pacific time on October 28, 2026, with no crash involved. The California Highway Patrol closed the freeway in both directions, and the southbound lanes stayed shut for about 10 hours, reopening around 3:30 a.m. Wednesday. Northbound traffic was released much sooner.
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The driver was not hurt and no other vehicle was involved. Officers were told only that the truck caught fire.
Closure from Winton Avenue to Route 92
According to ABC7 San Francisco, the CHP had closed both directions between Winton Avenue and Route 92 by 5:45 p.m., citing potential risks from hazardous smoke. Electrek quotes the patrol’s wording as “the potential risk of hazardous chemical smoke.” Northbound lanes reopened at 8:40 p.m. Tuesday, about three hours in. Southbound lanes were fully open again around 3:30 a.m., which ABC7 puts at about 9¾ hours after the closure began and Electrek rounds to 10. CHP Hayward announced the full closure and later posted that all lanes were open on X.
The patrol initially warned that the battery could burn for 15 to 18 hours, according to Electrek, and crews beat that estimate. With the southbound reopening at 3:30 a.m. roughly 9¾ hours after the closure began, the lanes opened between about five and eight hours sooner than the patrol’s warning allowed. Drive Tesla Canada adds that southbound traffic was held at Winton Avenue and diverted onto the off-ramp. Firefighters laid foam around the burned tractor. CHP told ABC7 that the flames from the truck’s lithium battery were “incredibly difficult to extinguish.” None of the reports reviewed names a fire agency that worked the scene, so the fire department’s own account of the suppression could not be confirmed from the coverage available.
The San Francisco Chronicle, in a report syndicated on Yahoo News, identified CHP Officer Rolando Guzman as the patrol’s voice on the closure and quoted him saying police shut down Interstate 880 in both directions “due to the potential risk of hazardous chemical smoke.” Guzman said the driver reported that the vehicle had ignited but did not know the cause. The Chronicle added that Caltrans was expected to impose a hard closure of the freeway, that traffic was diverted at Winton Avenue, and that the patrol said southbound lanes could stay closed for up to 18 hours while crews fought the fire and checked that the vehicle was safe to remove. It also noted that damaged lithium-ion cells can keep generating heat and reignite, which is why such fires are hard to put out.
No collision, no stated cause
The driver told patrol officers the rig caught fire and did not know why, and the cause is under investigation. The front of a Premier Trailer Leasing trailer was charred, and the operator of the tractor has not been identified. Tesla had not commented as of Electrek’s report, which notes that the company does not maintain a press office. Electrek’s headline and body both stress the absence of a crash, and ABC7’s account likewise describes only a truck that caught fire. Drive Tesla Canada, working from video, identified the truck as a Frito-Lay unit and one of Tesla’s pre-production test units, and says officers shut both directions within 10 minutes; no official source in the coverage confirms the ownership detail (Drive Tesla Canada’s report).
The 2024 Emigrant Gap fire for comparison
The National Transportation Safety Board’s investigation HWY24FH015 covers an earlier Tesla Semi fire. On August 19, 2024, at about 3:13 a.m., a 2024 Tesla Semi operated by a Tesla employee left Interstate 80 near Emigrant Gap in Placer County, California, struck a traffic delineator and a tree about 12.5 inches in diameter, and slid down an earthen slope. Its lithium-ion battery system ignited, the driver was uninjured, and crews used about 50,000 gallons of water. Westbound Interstate 80 was closed for about 14 hours and eastbound for about 15, according to the NTSB’s investigation page, and the truck was monitored for 24 hours with no reignition observed. The board lists the CHP, CAL FIRE and Caltrans as responders, and CAL FIRE also applied fire retardant from an aircraft as a precaution. It notes that driver-assistance features were fitted but not operational and could not be engaged, and its preliminary report came out September 12, 2024.
In that case the board records an impact before ignition. The Hayward reports describe none. The southbound closure on Interstate 880, at about 10 hours, was also shorter than either direction on Interstate 80 in 2024, though the CHP had warned of 15 to 18 hours before crews beat that estimate.
Two questions remain open in the records available: what ignited the battery on Interstate 880, and whether any agency will open a formal investigation like the NTSB’s earlier one. The CHP posts and ABC7 supply the timeline, and Tesla had not commented as of October 29. None of the coverage reviewed carries a statement from the NTSB, which investigated the 2024 fire but has not, in these reports, been tied to this one.
This article was produced with the assistance of AI and reviewed by Morning Overview editors prior to publication.
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