Wind, Location Hampered Fight to Save Pier

The tenacious Redondo Beach Pier fire was a challenge for firefighters.

Wind fanned the flames. It was fed by a tar-like preservative coating the pilings. But neither compared with the difficulty of getting close enough to fight the fire.

Fire engines had to park hundreds of yards from the fire. The concrete deck prevented firefighters from getting at the pilings that burned underneath. Masked firefighters wearing clumsy oxygen bottles and pulling heavy hoses had to creep under the pier along a narrow catwalk.

And in the water next to the pier, firefighting boats bobbed for hours, directing powerful streams of water at the forest of flaming pilings that supported restaurants, shops and walkways. The attack was also hampered when support for a fire main under the pier gave way.

The fire took 15 businesses, including the Edge and Breakers Seafood restaurants, devastated 34,000 square feet on the pier and caused almost $7 million in damage, officials said. Ten firefighters were treated for injuries.

On the pier Saturday, merchants in surviving stores were gamely trying to make the best of the three-day Memorial Day weekend and officials were trying to put the best face on the disaster.

“Yes, it is discouraging, but we’ll continue on,” said Redondo Beach Mayor Barbara Doerr.

It took at least 17 fire engines, four fireboats and 150 firefighters from Redondo Beach, Hermosa Beach, Manhattan Beach, Hawthorne, Torrance, El Segundo, Gardena and Los Angeles County to fight the fire.

The first boat on the scene equipped to fight the fire was skippered by Wally Hapke, a Los Angeles County lifeguard who normally rescues boaters whose engines have conked out.

Hapke, who docks in nearby King Harbor, said he went to the fire thinking “it was a waste-paper basket or something. We got around the corner and it was obvious it was a major fire.”

Hapke had no time to put on firefighting gear and, as his boat jockeyed near pilings, he and his assistant, Brian Merrigan, cut incongruous figures--dressed in thongs, swim trunks and T-shirts--among the masked and helmeted firefighters.

“They sure dress cool compared to firefighters,” commented Redondo Beach police officer Phil Keenan as the fire wound down. “This is the beach for God’s sakes!”

But before the fire was declared under control, there was no time for levity.

At 2:05 p.m., 45 minutes after the fire started near the middle of the horseshoe-shaped pier it still raged and poured thick, black smoke that could be seen for miles. Firefighters worried that the onshore, southwesterly wind would push the flames along both of its legs. They thought they might lose both the Edge and Cattlemens Steak House restaurants.

To set a firebreak, firefighters cut a two-foot trench the width of the pier. They also broke through the pier’s concrete deck to send crews underneath where the fire continued to spread.

Firefighters complained about circling news helicopters, saying they were fanning the flames and interfering with radio transmissions. The pilot of a KNX helicopter was ordered away from the area under threat of arrest.

‘Blocked by Wall of Flames’

At 2:25 p.m., the Edge restaurant caught fire under the pier. Firefighters reported they were “blocked by a wall of flames just west of the Cattlemens” restaurant. A fire captain ordered a boat to get inside the horse-shoe shaped structure to battle the fire from both sides.

At 2:35 p.m., part of the pier gave way and great tongues of flame leaped skyward. “We have lost everything (up) to the Port of Spain restaurant,” a firefighter reported on the radio. “We are retreating at this time. The fire is traveling too fast under the pier.”

Creosote Drips Off

Flaming creosote dripped off burning pilings and fell into the water.

Firefighters decided to cut losses, and back off 50 feet and make a stand near Tony’s restaurant on the south leg and Cattlemens restaurant on the north.

“Cut it off. Forget about what is burning. Get as much water under the pier . . . as you can and you can stop it,” a fire captain said.

At 2:42 p.m., a firefighter said that the Edge restaurant “is a complete total now.” Ten minutes later, firefighters were on top of the Cattlemens restaurant “making a stand.”

The combined attack--a pincers advance along the pier and fireboats on both sides of the pier--began to take effect.

At 3:20 p.m., a firefighter reported: “The smoke is dying down. It has changed color. It looks (as if) it is under control.”

On Saturday, the blackened portion of the pier still smoked and a fireboat drenched it with a cascade of water.