Fireworks Set Anaheim Apartments Ablaze : 40 Families Left Homeless in Disaster

Forty families were left homeless and a large Anaheim apartment complex incurred about $2.2 million in damage in a Thursday morning blaze that fire officials blamed on illegal fireworks.

A tenant and a firefighter suffered minor injuries and were treated at the scene, said Sheri Erlewine, an Anaheim fire and police spokeswoman. But she said the toll could have been much worse.

“This fire could have very, very easily resulted in fatalities,” Erlewine said. “Although there were a lot of younger tenants living here, there were also many elderly people who had moved in when the complex was built about 20 years ago. Because they move slower, they could have been trapped inside.”

256 Tenants Evacuated

In all, about 256 tenants were evacuated and sent to a nearby Red Cross shelter set up at Sunkist Elementary School. The blaze broke out about 3 a.m. and was brought under control by 6:10 a.m. by more than 100 firefighters from the Anaheim and Orange County fire departments.

Fire officials said fireworks ignited the building’s wood shake roof. The blaze came only a day after the apartment manager had distributed a flyer warning tenants of “immediate eviction” if any were caught jeopardizing the safety of others by using fireworks.

More than four unexploded skyrockets were found by investigators in front of the Casa de Valencia Apartments, 2633 E. La Palma Ave. In addition, remnants of illegal “bottle” rockets and pieces from exploded “safe and sane” fireworks that had been altered were found scattered in a front garden area, Erlewine said.

Anaheim’s ordinance legalizes some fireworks, but skyrockets, bottle rockets and others that explode in the air are not permitted.

Firefighters on the scene said the apartment building’s “common attic”--meaning that it didn’t have partitions or fire walls--added to Thursday morning’s disaster by allowing the flames to sweep through the building unimpeded. But they said there were no apparent building code violations in the complex.

Officials also said that when firefighters first arrived, there was a problem with low water pressure for a “few minutes.” One official said the pressure problem was under investigation.

Bangs Reported

Many tenants said that between 2 and 3 a.m., before the blaze erupted, they heard loud bangs and popping noises that they believed were caused by fireworks being set off by a group of young men in front of the complex.

Tenant Karen Potter, 19, who lived with her sister in an apartment whose bedroom windows face La Palma, said she was awakened by the noises and discovered that someone had tossed an ignited firecracker through her bedroom window.

“We had no screens and it came inside my window and exploded inside,” said Potter, who was visibly shaken from the experience.

Potter said she looked out and noticed three men shooting off fireworks while standing near a black car.

Large Group of Revelers

Based on interviews with tenants, fire investigators said the three were part of a larger group of revelers who are being sought for questioning. It was not immediately known whether any of them lived in the apartment complex.

“We had people setting off illegal fireworks that caused millions of dollars in damage, and at least 40 families are going to be left without a home for the next several months,” Erlewine said. “It was miraculous that no more injuries occurred.”

As flames soared 25 to 30 feet, sleepy-eyed tenants fled to safety. Some took with them only the clothes on their back.

Tim Underwood, 20, said the blaze swept through the building rapidly.

‘All I Saw Was Flames’

“A neighbor knocked on my door, and I opened it to look outside and the only thing I saw was flames,” Underwood said.

He awakened his girlfriend, Linda Dubosq, 20, pulled on some jeans and grabbed his wallet, checkbook and airplane tickets for a planned trip to Chicago before running out the apartment door. “The next time we looked out, it was all flames. We just ran,” he said.

Casa de Valencia has about 300 apartments, split off into two courts, both front and rear. The front court sustained most of the damage; the rear portion was largely unscathed.

Of 156 front-court apartments, 40 were destroyed and another 30 were damaged by smoke or fire, Erlewine said.

Paramedics at the scene treated a tenant for a cut on a leg and a firefighter for an injured knee.

Ordinance Passed

In 1982, after one of the worst fires in Southern California history destroyed 53 buildings and caused an estimated $50 million in damage, the Anaheim City Council passed an emergency ordinance banning untreated wood, or shake shingle, roofs on new construction.

It was shortly before dawn on April 21, 1982, that a fire driven by fierce Santa Ana winds swept through a four-block area at Cerritos Avenue and Euclid Street, west of Disneyland. That fire destroyed 393 apartment units, one house and one business.

However, the council did not make the ordinance retroactive, so it did not apply to existing buildings such as the Casa de Valencia Apartments, which were built about 20 years ago with shake roofs, Erlewine said.

According to the city’s current building codes, hotels and all residences with more than one dwelling unit are required to have “draft stops”--walls that cut attics into smaller compartments and often help stop the spread of fires, said Janet Baylor, a plan checker for the city Fire Department. But the Casa de Valencia’s construction appears to have predated that portion of the code.

Supervisor’s Comment

Louie Tan, plan check supervisor for the city’s building division, said he did not know precisely when the burned apartment complex was built and what the construction codes required at the time.

“I won’t know about it until a request has been made by the Fire Department for us to investigate,” Tan said, adding that such a request has not been made.

Some tenants interviewed Thursday said they called Anaheim police to investigate the group of revelers standing in front of the complex, but when police arrived people already were running from the flames and smoke.

Tenants praised a store clerk at a 24-hour market across the street for calling the Fire Department on the 911 emergency telephone number and then running over and knocking on doors to warn them about the blaze.

The clerk, later identified as Jaime Elizondo, 27, began kicking the doors and yelling, “Fire! Fire!” said Elizondo’s employer, Stan Glass.

Efforts Praised

Throughout the morning, appreciative tenants and firefighters walked into Glass’ store and praised Elizondo’s efforts.

Not all tenants were aroused by the commotion.

Huan Do, 71, who speaks only Vietnamese, said he didn’t understand the peril he was in, despite repeated knocks on his apartment door and people screaming, “Fire!”

“He doesn’t understand English, so he didn’t understand what they were talking about,” said Do’s nephew, Vinh Nguyen, 18, who escorted Do to the evacuation center.

Additionally, the uncle thought the yelling and door pounding were the result of a prank rather than a life-threatening situation.

“He ran out after a Vietnamese neighbor yelled at him in Vietnamese to leave,” the nephew said.

Do joined about 140 other tenants at the Red Cross shelter. In addition to shelter, the Red Cross was offering cash assistance to help tenants buy clothes and food.

Times staff writer Maria L. La Ganga contributed to this story.