They seem to be using Molotov cocktails - that is, about a liter of gasoline ignited and spread when the bottle breaks. Since the car body itself is metal and glass, I would guess that until the battery ignites, it’s much the same mechanism of any other car burning.

Plastics in the wheel wells, mirrors, tires are ignited, which burn hot enough to ignite more protected plastics. Eventually, the battery is heated to the point of thermal runaway (analogous to the fuel tank in an internal combustion car), and then it burns to the ground.

For me too. Watching that footage where it’s live and the second plane hits and everyone is speechless trying to process. Longest 5 seconds we will ever witness, it’s 5 seconds that went from “oh my an accident how could this happen” to “the world is not going to be the same after this, there’s no going back”

Your payments are not terrible for today’s car market, and you have a practical, late model car. It doesn’t seem like you will come out ahead on getting a different car because of the transaction costs associated (registration, etc).

If you don’t drive it, it will depreciate slower and when and if it no longer meets your needs you will get more for it. You could probably get an older model for cheaper, but it will inevitably need work and you roll the dice with being stuck with an expensive repair.

You could also lease an electric car with the stupid low lease prices they are offering, but then you are still on the hook for expensive insurance and are in a worse position in three years.

Dump any extra you have into extra payments on the car for an easy 7% ROI, and use it to get groceries once a week.

The other situation is safety. If you are driving a '95, and you have a baby or something, moving to an '08 gets you a lots of advancement in safety and you cannot pay to replace the people you care about.