Mammoth cleanup efforts were underway on Thursday, June 25, after crews knocked down a stubborn, week-old fire in a cold-storage food warehouse in Boyle Heights, where tons of food remains spoiling more than a week after the massive blaze broke out.
Firefighters moved into the overhaul phase of operations at the Lineage Logistics warehouse on the evening of Wednesday, June 24, after the Los Angeles Fire Department announced the fire had officially been knocked down.
The knockdown, which means that there are no more active flames and no threat of the fire spreading, was announced around 6 p.m. on Wednesday.
Los Angeles Fire Department Chief Jamie Moore told reporters during a Thursday news conference that fire crews managed to save half of the nearly 500,000-square-foot warehouse facility, although the entire structure suffered at least smoke and water damage.
The half of the building impacted directly by the fire was extensively dismantled during the firefight, and will likely be torn down in its entirety. Crews are still spraying water into the building as part of the overhaul effort, Moore added.
“We’re keeping everything well wet and cool, and we do have a small portion of area in the center of this building that is covered with product, where we still have a little bit of fire,” he said. “And we know that. But’s just too unsafe for our firefighters to get in there and dig that out, and that’s what the overhaul process is all about.”
The LAFD is on track to return control of the building to Lineage by Friday, Moore said, noting that there is still substantial work remaining to overhaul the structure — most notably disposing of the roughly 85 million pounds of frozen food that was in the warehouse.
Mayor Karen Bass said she will be issuing an executive order designed to “mobilize additional resources for Boyle Heights, as we enter the remediation and cleanup stage, including limiting the impacts as much as possible related to the cleanup of 85 million pounds of food.”
Bass said air purifiers and masks are still being made available to residents, and mobile health clinics are being brought into the community.
Smoke conditions in the surrounding area the warehouse fire have improved significantly since the knockdown, but some smoke may remain visible as firefighters continue to access and extinguish deep-seated hot spots, officials said.
A special Particle Pollution Advisory issued by the South Coast Air Quality Management District expired at 12:30 p.m. Wednesday. The LAFD, in a Tuesday, June 23 update, said testing for pollutants in the air, including ammonia, hydrogen fluoride, and toxic metals was done near the fire and in the adjacent neighborhoods, and found that no significant levels of any of those pollutants were present.
Moore said the city’s Emergency Management Department, Sanitation Department and other agencies were actively involved in the overhaul operations “to make sure that we continue to protect the community here in Boyle Heights.”
“We have sanitation straining the water so that we can ensure that the water that’s going into the storm drains is not going to affect or pollute our oceans,” Moore said. “They’re monitoring the quality of the water that’s going in there, and yes, you’re seeing product — some it’s what was at one time frozen fish, frozen animal products, some of it’s bakery products — flowing towards those strainers. But we’re catching them before they get into the draining, so it doesn’t end up in our oceans.”
The L.A. County Board of Supervisors, on Tuesday, June 23, ratified a local emergency and streamlined county resources for residents in unincorporated East L.A. and nearby cities affected by breathing thick smoke from the warehouse fire burning for a seventh day, as reports of possible environmental damage surfaced along the area’s waterways.
During the supervisors’ Tuesday meeting, Board Chair Hilda Solis said she’d heard that runoff from firefighting efforts had reached the L.A. River, killing fish downstream. L.A. County Public Works took samples from the river earlier this week and have yet to release the results.
Bass, meanwhile, said in a Tuesday statement that her office is now turning its focus to helping Boyle Heights residents and community members impacted by the fire recover in coordination with Councilmember Ysabel Jurado, whose 14th District includes Boyle Heights.
“I want to thank all the community members who have met with me to express their needs and concerns. I will work in close partnership with Councilmember Jurado to aggressively address their needs,” Bass said. “As we move forward, those responsible will be held accountable. Boyle Heights deserves protection. I share residents’ concerns, and I will fight for our communities that disproportionately shoulder the burden of incidents like this.”