Harbor Fire Chars Wharf, Fishing Boats

Fire charred 300 feet of wharf and scorched six fishing boats in Los Angeles Harbor early Sunday, causing an estimated $1.5 million in damage, authorities said.

No injuries were reported.

Firefighters on shore and in two fireboats battled the blaze, which was reported at 4:18 a.m. at Berth 73 near the Ports O’Call tourist village, Los Angeles Fire Department spokesman Jim Williamson said. The fire was put out at 6:30 a.m.

Damage was put at $1,558,600, including damage to the six fishing boats and nets, Williamson said.

“It was spreading right along under the dock,” said Ports O’Call security officer Vince Odenbrett, who watched it flare in thick timber and pilings under the wharf’s asphalt roadway. “The way it spread was amazing.”

Soaring Flames

Flames rose 40 feet, accompanied by dense smoke, as firefighters used jackhammers to break through the roadway to reach the flames, Odenbrett said.

The wharf was leased by a fishing cooperative and the boats were empty at the time. But arriving owners watched in anguish as their expensive vessels were scorched.

Odenbrett said that a man and a woman, owners of one boat, were weeping and that their daughter was hysterical.

The flames burned 8-foot-high piles of fishing nets stacked on the wharf, he said.

Two of the burned boats, the 90-foot Anna Maria II and the 90-foot Nancy Gean, will probably be declared losses, said Los Angeles Port Police Officer Michael Scotland.

Jim D’Amato, owner of the Anna Maria II, and about half a dozen family members were still lingering at the pier about noon after being stirred out of bed by news of the fire.

Insurance Canceled

D’Amato, 44, stared at the charred pilothouse of the boat he has fished from for the last 20 years.

“My insurance was canceled over a year ago,” he said. “They don’t insure old boats.”

The Italian immigrant said he will probably try to repair the 50-year-old boat, but until then he does not know what he and his crew of 10 will do for a living.

One of the fishing boats struck a fireboat while attempting to escape the flames, but damage from the collision was not serious, Scotland said.

The fire was another blow to the local fishing fleet, which has been hurt by the closing of local canning facilities and disputes with Mexico over fishing rights.

The cause of the blaze was under investigation, but may have been accidental, Scotland said.

“We think it may have started under the wharf,” he said. “There were some people doing welding and cutting earlier in the day. So it may have been a spark that started and smoldered.”

A man who helped fight the blaze had noticed slight smoke coming up from the dock about 3 1/2 hours before the fire was reported, but didn’t think it was anything serious and failed to call authorities, Odenbrett said.