Fire Destroys Fabric Wholesale Firm in Downtown L.A.

LOS ANGELES - More than 130 Los Angeles Firefighters fiercely battled flames early Thursday morning, when a major emergency fire erupted in a textile firm in downtown L.A.'s Warehouse District.

The Los Angeles Fire Department was notified of the blaze at 2:07 AM on April 18, 2013 by Los Angeles Police Officers on patrol, who noted fire within a fabric business at 710 East 7th Street.

Firefighters arrived quickly and forced entry to find heavy fire deep within the building laden with flammable products. An aggressive interior effort to subdue flames was made possible by LAFD crews opening the roof with chainsaws to release intense heat, smoke and flame.

The twenty minute interior offensive under the guidance of Assistant Chief Emile Mack was successful in saving the business office - before a severe structural compromise of the rest of the building forced a transition to defensive tactics, with the exterior use of heavy streams. The strongly held defensive posture of 133 firefighters prevented flames from spreading to nearby businesses.

The fire was controlled in just 92 minutes, as firefighters again entered the heavily damaged building to complete their task. Teams of Los Angeles Firefighters - including some using Fire Department bulldozers, ultimately labored for more than eighteen hours to salvage essential belongings and assure complete ember extinguishment among tons of stacked and rack mounted fabric.

No injuries were reported.

Fire loss to Sharp Fabric is still being tabulated. The cause of the early morning inferno remains undetermined.

Dispatched Units: E9 T9 RA809 RA209 E4 E10 T10 E210 SQ21 EM1 BC1 BC11 E15 E17 E3 T3 E203 DC1 E211 T11 EM11 BC13 T27 E227 E27 UR27 RA27 RA827 UR88 BC5 RA900 E2 E202 T2 EA1 RA10 RA858 RT59 AR1 DT1 TP2 TP3 LD1 LD2 DT2 DT3 EA1 T3 E203 E12 E3 T2 E202

Submitted by Brian Humphrey, Spokesman
Los Angeles Fire Department

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L.A. Firefighters Battle Fire In Downtown Party Supply Store

LOS ANGELES – More than ninety Los Angeles Firefighters battled a Greater Alarm Structure Fire in an open air market, in the Produce District of downtown Los Angeles.

On Sunday, February 03, 2013 at 7:09 PM, firefighters were called to 853 South Central Avenue. The LAFD arrived quickly to find a 20’ x 30’ unit in a two story concrete, commercial building with fire through the roof.

Fire companies made a quick and aggressive interior attack with large diameter hose lines, while colleagues preformed vertical ventilation. The rapid and vigorous fire attack limited the blaze to the involved party supply store and prevented the spread of fire to adjacent buildings. A total of 93 firefighters, under the command of Battalion Chief Greg Gibson, fully extinguished the flames in just 18 minutes. Firefighters remained on scene for over 3 hours to perform a thorough overhaul and salvage contents of the building. There were no injuries.
 
Loss from the fire was limited to $50,000 ($35,000 structure & $15,000 contents). Though the blaze was determined to have started outside and spread into the building, the cause of the fire remains under investigation by the LAFD Arson/Counter-Terrorism Section.

Dispatched Units: E9 T9 RA9 E17 RA17 E210 E10 T10 SQ21 EM1 BC1 BC11 E15 E14 E4 E203 T3 DC1 E211 T11 EM11 BC13 T27 E227 E27 UR27 RA27 UR88 BC5 RA209 AR1

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Submitted by Katherine Main, Spokesperson
Los Angeles Fire Department

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LA Firefighters Battle Blaze in Downtown Wholesale District

On Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 0:22 AM, 18 Companies of Los Angeles Firefighters, 7 LAFD Rescue Ambulances, 2 Arson Units, 1 Urban Search and Rescue Unit, 1 Hazardous Materials Team, 1 EMS Battalion Captain, 6 Battalion Chief Officer Command Teams, 1 Division Chief Officer Command Team, 1 Rehab Air Tender, 1 Emergency Air and 137 total firefighters, all under the direction of Assistant Chief Daryl Arbuthnott, responded to a Major Emergency Structure Fire at 1238 East Olympic Boulevard in the Wholesale District.


 
Firefighters arrived to find a row of one-story commercial buildings covering 8,722 square-feet with heavy fire showing from two units. Worker's outside of the non-occupied business flagged down Firefighters and assisted access, eliminating the need of forcible entry. Additional resources were quickly called and large hose streams were deployed to attain maximum water-flow on this blaze.

The contents of this fire were highly combustible as the occupancy was a party-supplies company dealing largely in pinatas and other paper decorations. Firefighters were quickly forced into a defensive attack due to intense flames compromising the integrity of the structure, resulting in a full collapse of the roof other than the arch-trusses.

Complete extinguishment of the 90 year-old sprinklered building was obtained in one hour and 26 minutes, before anyone was injured. The cause of this early morning blaze was contributed to sparks from workers repairing rolling steel doors. The dollar loss is still being tabulated.

Submitted by Erik Scott & Matt Spence, Spokesmen
Los Angeles Fire Department

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Blaze Injures 1 Firefighter & Damages Structures Downtown

On Sunday, May 29, 2011 at 1:25 AM, 14 Companies of Los Angeles Firefighters, 7 LAFD Rescue Ambulances, 1 Arson Unit, 2 Urban Search and Rescue Units, 1 Hazardous Materials Team, 3 EMS Battalion Captains, 4 Battalion Chief Officer Command Teams, 1 Division Chief Officer Command Team, 1 Emergency Air, 1 Emergency Lighting, 1 Rehab Utility, 1 Rehab Air Tender, DWP and LAPD all under the direction of Assistant Chief Daryl Arbuthnott responded to a Greater Alarm Structure Fire at 1171 East 10th Street in the Wholesale District of downtown Los Angeles.

Firefighters arrived to find a large outside fire exposing the rear of two buildings, a tall warehouse connected by a division wall to a one-story building separated into an approximate half dozen, 50' x 100' individual stores containing party supplies.

Firefighters made forcible entry with rotary saws through multiple rolling steel doors into the warehouse to allow fire attack teams inside the unoccupied structure. Simultaneously, their colleagues swiftly took to the conventional bridge truss roof to perform vertical ventilation. Firefighters utilized heavy hose streams and ladder pipe operations to pour large amounts of water in the open lots where additional products were intensely burning, however the fire attack remained offensive. Flames also damaged one section of power lines, pole to pole, causing them to fall.

The first arriving 110 firefighters were able to extinguish the blaze in one hour and eight minutes before any civilians were injured. One Firefighter assigned to a Truck Company suffered back injury and was transported to a local hospital in fair condition.

The total dollar loss is estimated at $195,000 ($120,000 property and $75,000 contents). The cause of the early morning blaze remains under active investigation.

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Submitted by Erik Scott, Spokesman
Los Angeles Fire Department

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