The 2019 Jaguar I-Pace is a fairly practical hatchback disguised as an electric crossover, but it has one surprising feature that might be unexpected for a low vehicle powered purely by batteries—it can wade through 19 inches of water. Almost 20, in fact.
As I sat there shifting on my feet at the launch presentation for the production I-Pace at Jaguar’s brand new headquarters (which was clearly not designed for presentations, considering we had to do it in the building’s cafeteria and didn’t have any seats) last week, I perked up a bit when Wolfgang Ziebart, Technical Design Director for Jaguar, amusedly announced the I-Pace has a wade depth of 500 millimeters, or 19.68 inches.
In a later interview from the show floor of the New York Auto Show, I asked Dr. Ziebart about it. He told me it was never a specific engineering objective, but since Jaguar and Land Rover share the same engineering team, it just sort of happened.
To put those 19 inches into context, the Subaru Outback has a maximum wade depth of 18 inches, the Jeep Cherokee is 19 inches, the Jaguar F-Pace is 20.7 inches, the Land Rover Discovery Sport is 23.6 inches, and the Jeep Wrangler is 30 inches.
Considering the I-Pace rides much lower than the Cherokee and has the same wade depth, it would probably be pretty shocking to see one of these things pushing through over a foot-and-a-half of water.
So not only is the I-Pace a practical EV for those concerned with cutting off emissions, but it’s also preparing for climate change by being surprisingly capable for when the ocean levels drastically rise. I like engineering that’s looking ahead.