BOYLE HEIGHTS (CNS) – Shelter-in-place orders remained in effect Friday for a swath of Boyle Heights as crews vented smoke and battled pockets of fire inside a massive cold-storage facility that burned earlier this week.
Although the fire was officially contained Wednesday evening, fire crews remained at the scene throughout the night and through Thursday, conducting mop-up operations. Shortly after 2:30 p.m. Thursday, the Los Angeles Fire Department announced it was beginning to ventilate the building, releasing smoke from inside the Lineage storage facility.
As a result, the LAFD again reissued a shelter-in-place order affecting residents and businesses in an area stretching south of the 101 Freeway to roughly Washington Boulevard, east of Lorena Street and west of Indiana Street. Residents in the area west of Lorena Street were advised they may see smoke as a result of the ventilation work, the LAPD said.
Residents in the shelter-in-place area were advised to close their windows and doors and turn off window-mounted air conditioning and heating units.
Although the order was originally expected to remain in effect for only a few hours, it continued into Thursday, with crews encountering pockets of fire still burning inside a freezer container inside the structure.
That fire added to the smoke emanating from the building, and work to fully douse those flames and vent the building continued into Friday.
A Particle Pollution Advisory originally issued at 5 p.m. Wednesday by the South Coast Air Quality Management District had been set to expire at 10 a.m. Thursday, but was extended through 12:30 p.m. Friday.
“Due to sustained smoke impacts in the nearby community, South Coast AQMD continues to review particulate matter data from our regional air monitors as well as local air quality sensor networks,” according to an agency statement.
“Smoldering material may continue to affect air quality directly downwind; cooler smoke plumes may not rise as high, leading to ground-level visibility issues and possible ash deposition,” the SCAQMD advised.
Residents with respiratory conditions or other health concerns were advised to wear masks and keep doors and windows closed, limiting exposure to outdoor air whenever possible for themselves and their pets.
The LAFD said hazardous materials specialists were continuing to monitor air quality at and around the scene of the fire and had detected no elevated contaminant levels or hazardous conditions.
The fire was reported shortly after 2:30 p.m. Wednesday at Lineage cold storage in the 1400 block of South Los Palos Street, and the firefight involved dozens of helicopter water drops, a tactic rarely used outside wildfire incidents.
The fire rapidly spread across solar panels on the roof of the 491,000- square-foot warehouse, while an ammonia leak developed inside the building and thick smoke billowed into the air, prompting shelter-in-place orders for nearby residents and businesses on Wednesday.
The intensity of the flames and heightened danger posed by the ammonia leak forced LAFD crews to pull away from the structure and assume a defensive posture, pouring water on the building from the exterior.
As the fire spread, LAFD hose lines were unable to reach parts of the blaze, so at least three water-dropping helicopters were brought in to help halt the flames, dumping thousands of gallons of water onto the building.
LAFD Chief Jaime Moore called it a “very unique” situation for crews to use water-dropping helicopters for a structure fire, but the size of the warehouse necessitated the aerial operation.
Moore said he has been with the LAFD for 31 years, and it was only the second time he could recall aerial water drops being used to battle a structure fire. The previous incident occurred about six years ago in Echo Park.
About 5:30 p.m. Wednesday, fire officials reported that the spread of the flames on the roof had been halted, and the original shelter-in-place order was lifted Wednesday night.
No injuries were reported. It was unclear what sparked the blaze.
The solar panels on the same building also caught fire in August 2024, but LAFD crews were able to douse that blaze in less than an hour with no injuries.
According to the Lineage website, the facility offers cold storage, customs brokerage, drayage and blast freezing. The facility “is built to handle high-volume inventory and streamline … global cold chain from production floor to international delivery.”
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