Tesla Motors shares continued to fall Thursday as the automaker confirmed a third fire in one of its high-end electric cars and a major auto reviewer pointed out problems with its Model S luxury hatchback. 
 
 The 9%, or $13.40, decline in mid-morning trading to $137.76 followed a 15% plunge in the shares Wednesday after the automaker said limited supplies of batteries were hampering sales and that it was spending heavily on research and development to design new models. Tesla shares have been on a run for most of the year, rising about 400% before this reversal. 
 
 Car shopping website Edmunds.com said its 2013 Model S was “making an ominous noise under acceleration and deceleration. It originates from the rear of the car and seems to be getting worse.” 
 
 PHOTOS: Tesla Model S 
 
 It is a complaint that’s also starting to show up on Tesla’s owners forum, an online discussion group hosted by the automaker for drivers of its cars. 
 
 “Mine had that and it got bad at 70 mph,” said one owner, posting under the “mortgagebruce” moniker. 
 
 He said Tesla had to replace the drive unit twice to fix the problem. 
 
 Tesla also replaced the drive unit on the Edmunds car, but declined to tell the company what caused the problem. It also replaced the driver door mechanism because of another problem. The car has just less than 11,000 miles on the road. 
 
 “We're not sure what to think about the fact that both of these repairs were completed with just one overnight stay,” said Mike Schmidt, Edmunds’ vehicle testing manager. “Maybe the dealer is really on the ball. Maybe the supply chain is short. Or maybe the parts are readily available because they've seen these before.” 
 
 Tesla spokeswoman Liz Jarvis Shean said she was not familiar with the Edmunds complaint. 
 
 Meanwhile, another Model S electric car caught fire Wednesday near Smyrna, Tenn., following a crash. This was the third Model S to have caught fire in the last five weeks. One burned near Seattle and another in Mexico. Both cars were in crashes and the fires injured no one. 
 
 
 
 Normally, car fires are not significant events that influence investors. There are about 150,000 annually, according to the National Fire Protection Assn. However, safety officials have been tracking fires in electric cars, as well as computers and other equipment, out of concern that the lithium-ion battery systems might be fire-prone. 
 
 Earlier this year, federal regulators grounded Boeing 787 planes for four months after batteries on two planes overheated, with one catching on fire. Boeing later ordered modifications to the jets to increase ventilation and insulation near the batteries, but the company and investigators never determined the root cause of the overheating. 
 
 The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration reviewed the Tesla fire in Seattle and concluded it was caused by the accident rather than a vehicle defect. 
 
 Tesla said it contacted the driver of the car in Tennessee and noted he was not injured and “believes the car saved his life. Our team is on its way to Tennessee to learn more about what happened in the accident.” 
 
 “The problem is that we have three fires in six weeks,” said Karl Brauer, senior analyst at Kelley Blue Book, the car information company. “For a company with a stock price based as much or more on image than financials, those recurring headlines are highly damaging.” 
 
 The Palo Alto automaker said Tuesday it posted a loss of $38.5 million, or 32 cents per share, in the third quarter. That compares to a loss of $110.8 million, or $1.05 per share, in the same period a year earlier. Now that it is delivering cars, revenue grew to $431 million from just $50.1 million a year earlier. 
 
 Follow me on Twitter (@LATimesJerry), Facebook and Google+. 
 
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 What's behind Toyota settlement of sudden acceleration lawsuit ||||| 1 of 2. A Telsa Model S automobile destroyed by a fire is seen in a handout picture from the Tennessee Highway Patrol taken in Smyrna, Tennessee November 6, 2013. 
 
 DETROIT (Reuters) - Tesla Motor Inc's (TSLA.O) Model S electric car has suffered its third fire in six weeks, sending its shares down nearly 9 percent in Thursday midday trading. 
 
 The Tesla Motors Club website contains pictures and a story about another fire involving a Model S that a company spokeswoman confirmed. The accident occurred on Wednesday in Smyrna, Tennessee, where Nissan Motor Co (7201.T) makes the Leaf electric car. 
 
 While none of the drivers in any of the accidents were injured, the glaring headlines about fires was not welcome for Tesla. 
 
 "For a company with a stock price based as much or more on image than financials, those recurring headlines are highly damaging," Kelley Blue Book senior analyst Karl Brauer said. 
 
 Morgan Stanley analyst Adam Jonas said the risk of a formal investigation by U.S. safety regulators "could raise near-term concerns to a higher level in terms of cost, image and production disruption." 
 
 Tesla said it has been in touch with the driver, who was not injured. The vehicle was driven by Juris Shibayama, 38, of Murfreesboro, Tennessee, according to the highway patrol. 
 
 "Our team is on its way to Tennessee to learn more about what happened in the accident," Tesla spokeswoman Elizabeth Jarvis-Shean said in a statement. "We will provide more information when we're able to do so." 
 
 The company said the fire was the result of an accident and was not a spontaneous event. 
 
 The Tennessee Highway Patrol said the afternoon incident occurred on Interstate 24 in Smyrna when the electric car "ran over a tow hitch" that "hit the undercarriage of the vehicle causing an electrical fire." 
 
 The Model S undercarriage has armor plating that protects the lithium-ion battery pack. Tesla said it did not yet know whether the fire involved the car's battery. 
 
 Tesla's battery pack is made up of small lithium-ion battery cells that are also used in laptop computers, an approach not used by other automakers. The battery pack stretches across the base of the vehicle. In comparison, General Motors Co (GM.N) uses large-format battery cells in a T-shape in the center of the Chevrolet Volt plug-in hybrid car. 
 
 Other automakers have dealt with battery fires in electrified vehicles, including GM's Volt and Mitsubishi Motors Corp's (7211.T) i-MiEV. 
 
 The highway patrol report did not say how fast the 2013 model Tesla Model S was traveling in Tennessee, but the driver was able to pull off the roadway and get out of the car. The incident occurred four miles from the exit for the Nissan plant. 
 
 A woman who answered the phone at the lot where the car was towed said Tesla officials had arrived Thursday morning and were inspecting the vehicle. 
 
 On Tuesday, Tesla forecast a weaker-than-expected fourth-quarter profit and posted third-quarter Model S deliveries that disappointed some analysts. 
 
 The first Model S fire occurred on October 1 near Seattle, when the car collided with a large piece of metal debris in the road that punched a hole through the armor plate protecting the battery pack. U.S. safety regulators at the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration later said they found no evidence to indicate a vehicle defect. 
 
 The second fire took place later in the month in Merida, Mexico, when according to reports a car drove through a roundabout, crashed through a concrete wall and hit a tree. 
 
 Neither driver was injured in the earlier accidents and in all three cases the company said the owners have asked for replacement cars. 
 
 After the first fire, Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk defended the safety performance of electric cars. "For consumers concerned about fire risk, there should be absolutely zero doubt that it is safer to power a car with a battery" than a conventional gas-powered vehicle, he said on a blog post. 
 
 Company executives called that first fire a "highly uncommon occurrence," likely caused by a curved metal object falling off a semi-trailer and striking up into the underside of the car in a "pole-vault effect." 
 
 At the time, Musk did not say if Tesla would make any changes to the Model S battery design as a result of the first accident. Jarvis-Shean had no immediate comment when asked if such changes were being considered. 
 
 Tesla's shares fell as low as $137.62 on Nasdaq. 
 
 Since the first fire, Tesla's shares have lost more than 27 percent and this week's declines are the worst one-week drop since May 2012. 
 
 (Additional reporting by Deepa Seetharaman; Editing by Gerald E. McCormick and Maureen Bavdek) ||||| Tesla Motors Inc. (TSLA)’s third fire in five weeks involving a Model S suggests U.S. regulators need to examine the luxury electric car, a safety advocate said after a Tennessee accident. 
 
 Shares of the Palo Alto, California-based carmaker led by Elon Musk slid 7.5 percent to $139.77 at the close yesterday in New York after reports of the newest fire. That decline follows a 15 percent drop Nov. 6 after the carmaker’s third-quarter results and fourth-quarter outlook disappointed investors. It was the biggest two-day plunge since Dec. 27, 2010. 
 
 The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration “absolutely has to investigate” the Nov. 6 Tennessee incident, Clarence Ditlow, executive director of the Center for Auto Safety, based in Washington, said in a phone interview. 
 
 A Model S driver struck a tow hitch in the middle of a lane on Interstate 24 near Murfreesboro, Tennessee, damaging the car’s undercarriage and causing the fire, Dalya Qualls, a Tennessee Highway Patrol spokeswoman, said in an e-mail. The driver pulled the car over and was uninjured, Qualls said. 
 
 NHTSA declined to investigate a Model S fire in Washington state in October, the first such reported blaze, in which metal debris was involved. 
 
 Source: Tennessee Highway Patrol via Bloomberg A firefighter works at the scene of an accident involving a Tesla Model S sedan near Murfreesboro, Tennessee on Nov. 6, 2013. The driver, identified as Juris Shibayama, struck a tow hitch that was in the middle of a lane, which damaged the car’s undercarriage and caused the fire, said Dalya Qualls, a Tennessee Highway Patrol spokeswoman. Close A firefighter works at the scene of an accident involving a Tesla Model S sedan near... Read More Close Open Source: Tennessee Highway Patrol via Bloomberg A firefighter works at the scene of an accident involving a Tesla Model S sedan near Murfreesboro, Tennessee on Nov. 6, 2013. The driver, identified as Juris Shibayama, struck a tow hitch that was in the middle of a lane, which damaged the car’s undercarriage and caused the fire, said Dalya Qualls, a Tennessee Highway Patrol spokeswoman. 
 
 “It appears there’s inadequate shielding on the bottom of these vehicles,” Ditlow said. “Road debris is a known hazard to the undercarriage of vehicles.” 
 
 The U.S. agency “will contact the local authorities who are looking into the incident to determine if there are vehicle safety implications that merit agency action,” Karen Aldana, a spokeswoman for NHTSA, said in an e-mail. 
 
 Tesla Team 
 
 Liz Jarvis-Shean, a Tesla spokeswoman, declined to comment on Ditlow’s remarks and on whether the company needed to strengthen the aluminum casing that houses the 1,000-pound (454-kilogram) lithium-ion battery that powers the Model S. 
 
 “We have been in contact with the driver, who was not injured and believes the car saved his life,” Jarvis-Shean said in an earlier e-mail. “Our team is on its way to Tennessee to learn more about what happened in the accident. We will provide more information when we’re able to do so.” 
 
 Tesla, the best-performing automotive stock this year, has been under scrutiny as Chief Executive Officer Musk works to create the world’s biggest and most profitable seller of electric cars. Even with this week’s declines, Tesla shares have surged more than fourfold this year after reporting its first quarterly profits. 
 
 ‘Rocket Science’ 
 
 The Washington state Model S fire took place Oct. 1, and another occurred in Mexico in mid-October. NHTSA said Oct. 24 it found no evidence the first fire resulted from defects or violations of U.S. safety standards. The agency has said it doesn’t investigate vehicle accidents outside the U.S. 
 
 A possible fix for the Model S, priced from $70,000 to more than $100,000, “is not rocket science,” Ditlow said. “Probably the simplest task Tesla has is putting a strong steel shield on the bottom of the car.” 
 
 The Model S has “a six-millimeter thick armor plate on the bottom,” Musk told Bloomberg Television last month. 
 
 A U.S. investigation or recall of the Model S “could raise near-term concerns to a higher level in terms of cost, image and production disruption to Tesla,” Adam Jonas, an analyst for Morgan Stanley, said in a research report yesterday. 
 
 “We would be very surprised if Tesla has not already launched its own investigation into the cause of battery compartment intrusion to explore causes and potential remedies,” said Jonas, who rates the stock overweight. A voluntary recall “would be consistent with Tesla’s extraordinary efforts to build brand value and trust.” 
 
 Battery Issues 
 
 Lithium-ion batteries have come into widespread use in laptop computers, consumer electronics, rechargeable cars and hybrids, and even aircraft, owing to their lighter weight and high energy density. 
 
 Tesla isn’t the first company to experience battery pack-related fires. The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration ordered the grounding of Boeing Co. (BA)’s 787 Dreamliner aircraft this year after meltdowns of lithium-ion batteries. 
 
 NHTSA formally investigated fires in two other battery-powered vehicles, General Motors Co. (GM)’s Chevrolet Volt and Fisker Automotive Inc.’s Karma. 
 
 GM conducted a voluntary program to strengthen the Volt’s battery pack. Fisker, which stopped making plug-in Karmas more than a year ago, issued recalls to fix flawed lithium-ion packs at risk of shutting down and for a separate wiring issue linked to a fire. 
 
 Tesla’s Image 
 
 Multiple reports of battery fires may harm Tesla’s image, said Karl Brauer, an industry analyst for Kelley Blue Book in Irvine, California. 
 
 “At some point the cause of the fire, the safety of the drivers and even the attitude of the owners -- all three apparently want another car -- stops mattering because you’re left with recurring headlines featuring the words ‘Tesla’ and ‘fire,’” Brauer said. 
 
 “For a company with a stock price based as much or more on image than financials, those recurring headlines are highly damaging,” he said. 
 
 Musk’s net worth has more than tripled this year to $7.4 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. Share declines yesterday for both Tesla and SolarCity Corp., another Musk-affiliated company, cut his wealth by $576.8 million, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. 
 
 Musk is Tesla’s largest shareholder. Daimler AG and Toyota Motor Corp. (7203) are also investors in the company. 
 
 The Tennessee Model S fire was first reported on the ValueWalk website, which cited photos of the car fire posted on the Tesla Motors Club forum website. 
 
 To contact the reporters on this story: Alan Ohnsman in Los Angeles at aohnsman@bloomberg.net; Angela Greiling Keane in Washington at agreilingkea@bloomberg.net 
 
 To contact the editor responsible for this story: Jamie Butters at jbutters@bloomberg.net
– This would qualify as a bad day for Elon Musk and his Tesla Motors. The electric-car company got a spate of bad publicity after reports emerged of a third car fire in six weeks, reports Reuters. The company's stock slid nearly 8% on the news, which wasn't helped by a negative national review at Edmunds, notes the LA Times. As for the fire: The driver of a Model S in Tennessee ran over a tow hitch on an interstate, and the resulting damage to the undercarriage led to the fire. The driver pulled over and escaped unhurt. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration “absolutely has to investigate," the director of an auto safety group tells Bloomberg. “It appears there’s inadequate shielding on the bottom of these vehicles." The negative review, meanwhile, complained that the Model S tested was “making an ominous noise under acceleration and deceleration. It originates from the rear of the car and seems to be getting worse.” Tesla then replaced the drive unit on the vehicle, along with a mechanism on the driver-side door. "We're not sure what to think about the fact that both of these repairs were completed with just one overnight stay,” says an Edmunds official. “Maybe the dealer is really on the ball. Maybe the supply chain is short. Or maybe the parts are readily available because they've seen these before.”