Smoky Fire’s Toxic Threat Shuts Down I-5, Amtrak

Main freeway and railroad links between Los Angeles and San Diego were closed for more than five hours Tuesday morning after a fire broke out in a pesticide storage area on Camp Pendleton, blowing billows of suspected toxic smoke across eight lanes of Interstate 5.

A seven-mile section of the freeway was closed from 6:15 to 11:33 a.m., causing massive traffic tie-ups at both ends.

Motorists were detoured onto winding two-lane roads through the Marine base, from the Las Pulgas gate south to the main Camp Pendleton gate at Oceanside, bypassing the freeway stretch where drifting smoke obscured vision and posed a toxic hazard.

Most drivers were delayed two hours, but no major accidents were reported, a California Highway Patrol spokeswoman said.

The three-alarm fire broke out about 5:30 a.m. in the Stuart Mesa area of Camp Pendleton, on 425 acres leased to Oceanside growers Gene and Harry Singh. Flames destroyed several corrugated iron sheds that stored pesticides and soil fumigants used on tomato vines and other crops. Several explosions were heard as far as 20 miles away, but Camp Pendleton information officers could not verify whether pesticide drums or nearby butane tanks were involved.

A westerly wind, unusual except during Santa Ana conditions, blew the fumes and smoke toward the ocean and away from populated portions of the base, Staff Sgt. John Midgette said. No evacuations were ordered and there were no reports of toxic poisoning, base spokesmen said.

San Diego County hazardous materials teams, airlifted to the fire scene four miles north of Oceanside by a San Diego County Sheriff’s Department helicopter, found 20 55-gallon drums of the pesticide dichloropropane--known as Telone--that had exploded during the fire.

Gary Stephany, head of the San Diego County Environmental Health Division, said the highly toxic soil fumigant was used to sterilize the soil where the crops were being grown. A spokesman for the Singh organization said that the pesticide barrels were empty, but Stephany said that at least four of the containers contained chemical materials when they exploded.

The pesticide dissipates rapidly, however, and has no long-lasting effects, he said.

None of the 25 firefighters and other persons treated at the Navy Hospital on Camp Pendleton showed signs of toxic poisoning, Stephany said. Most of those treated were suffering from smoke inhalation and heat stress and exhaustion, he said.

Train Service Disrupted

Amtrak spokesman Clifford Black said five Los Angeles-San Diego Amtrak passenger trains were delayed or canceled Tuesday before Santa Fe Railway officials reopened the tracks at 11:30 a.m.

A northbound Amtrak train, which left San Diego at 5:25 a.m., was halted at Oceanside because of the fire. Its passengers were bused back to San Diego, then bused to Los Angeles on inland Interstate 15, Black said. The nonstop Amtrak buses operated between the San Diego and Los Angeles train stations until the rail line was reopened. Commuter train shuttles between Los Angeles and San Juan Capistrano remained in service, he said.

Santa Fe Railway spokesman Tom Blakely said that a spur track and several signal wires were damaged by the fire and exploding debris at the Stuart Mesa farm storage area but that the main Santa Fe track was not harmed. Freight service, which operates once a day from Los Angeles to San Diego, was not affected.

Highway Patrol officers in Oceanside said that motorists’ tempers and automobile engines overheated in the traffic jams, but the only stranded travelers were those who had stopped at a rest area on southbound Interstate 5, south of the Las Pulgas off-ramp. More than two dozen cars and trucks in the rest stop were forced to wait until the southbound lanes were reopened five hours later.

Using Precaution

Civilian firefighters manning the Camp Pendleton fire equipment wore heavy clothing and used breathing equipment and oxygen tanks as protection against the toxic fumes. The extra protection “probably wasn’t needed,” Stephany said, “but it was wise to be on the safe side.”

Stephany said that the county’s hazardous materials unit was alerted by the Highway Patrol about 9 a.m.--three and a half hours after the fire broke out--”and we had a team on its way out there by 9:15. Most of us heard about the fire on the radio earlier, but there was no report of toxic chemicals being involved.”

“We would have liked to have been notified about this incident earlier,” Stephany said, “and we plan to get together with Pendleton authorities on working out a plan that will put us in the picture.”

Camp Pendleton officials did not reveal the cause of the early-morning fire, saying only that it was under investigation. But a farm security guard familiar with the area said that the overnight cold snap probably prompted some of the farm workers sleeping in the fields to seek shelter in the storage shed. The civilian guard said the practice is quite common during rainy or cold weather. The blaze could have been started from a fire in the shed left untended by the farm workers, he said.

Times staff writer David Smollar contributed to this story.