Yes, Corvettes are made from “fiberglass.” Yes, when subjected to the intense heat of a house fire that spreads to the garage, the body of a Corvette will pretty much disappear. But let’s face it – any fire intense enough to consume a Corvette isn’t going to leave much of a steel-bodied car worth saving, either.
In this particular case, a Menifee, California residential fire that destroyed one house and damaged a neighboring one also claimed the Y-Body parked in the garage. From what’s left, it’s possible to identify the car as a C4 Corvette – the LT1 throttle body is a dead giveaway. In the Press-Enterprise blog post describing the damage, author Peter Surowski says, “A Corvette has a fiberglass body. This is great in some cases. They hold up well in a race because they’re lightweight. In another case, such as when they’re sitting in a burning garage, they’re not so great.”
We would point out that whether the body is made of fiberglass, sheet molded composite (as this C4 was), aluminum, steel, or asbestos, a fire that turns a whole garage into rubble and ash is going to reduce anything inside to a burned-out hulk – at least with this Corvette, there won’t be any non-metallic waste to separate out from the scrap metal once it gets to the recycling yard…
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