{"id":1133148,"date":"2022-06-24T12:56:49","date_gmt":"2022-06-24T12:56:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/06\/24\/electric-car-kills-two-after-falling-from-an-office\/"},"modified":"2022-06-24T12:56:49","modified_gmt":"2022-06-24T12:56:49","slug":"electric-car-kills-two-after-falling-from-an-office","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/06\/24\/electric-car-kills-two-after-falling-from-an-office\/","title":{"rendered":"Electric car kills two after falling from an office"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Electric car kills two \/ Credit: WEIBO<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Chinese electric carmaker Nio says that two people were killed when one of its vehicles fell from the third floor of its headquarters in Shanghai.<\/p>\n

One member of staff and a person from a partner company died in the crash.<\/p>\n

The incident took place on Wednesday at about 17:20 local time, the firm said. The people who died were inside the vehicle as it fell from the building.<\/p>\n

Nio says it immediately started an investigation into the incident in co-operation with government officials.<\/p>\n

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The third storey area from where the car fell has been variously described as a showroom, a testing facility or a car park.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur company has collaborated with public security department to launch the investigation and analysis of the cause of the accident. Based on the analysis of the situation at the scene, we can initially confirm that this was an accident (not caused by the vehicle),\u201d the company said in a statement.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe feel very sad about this accident and would like to express our deepest condolences to our colleague and partner employee who lost their lives. A team has been set up to help the families,\u201d it added.<\/p>\n

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Terrible story of two test drivers at #China<\/a>\u2019s electrical vehicle manufacturer NIO being killed when a car somehow smashed out of a building and came crashing down from a great height. pic.twitter.com\/4ZNI2t7LqZ<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Stephen McDonell (@StephenMcDonell) June 23, 2022<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Nio\u2019s initial statement on Weibo attracted more than 1,000 comments within half an hour, but was then taken down.<\/p>\n

The last sentence of the statement \u201cnot related to the vehicle itself\u201d triggered many angry responses from social media users.<\/p>\n

One comment read \u201cit shows the cold blood of capitalism\u201d, while another said, \u201cthe last sentence is so indifferent. They [test drivers] came to test the vehicle, but you say [the accident] has nothing to do with the vehicle?\u201d.<\/p>\n

Yet another Weibo user said: \u201cIt should be public security bureau to confirm if it\u2019s an accident or not.\u201d<\/p>\n

The car maker has since posted a revised version of the statement, which still refers to the crash as an accident but now has \u201cnot caused by the vehicle\u201d in brackets apparently to de-emphasise that part of the sentence. All the comments to the new post are now \u201cRIP\u201d.<\/p>\n

Nio is at the forefront of China\u2019s homegrown drive to dominate the electric vehicle industry. It has staked a lot on interchangeable batteries in its cars as a way to overcome customer concerns about frequent charging.<\/p>\n

The company is a rival to multi-billionaire Elon Musk\u2019s US-based electric car maker Tesla, which has a major manufacturing plant in Shanghai.<\/p>\n

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