Fire in Air Conditioner Critically Burns 2 Men
Two repairmen were critically injured Saturday at a Glendale convalescent home when a flash fire started in an air-conditioning compressor they were working on, authorities said.
The repairmen, Alfred Galindo, 40, and Salvador Gallardo, 57, were in critical condition Saturday at St. Joseph Medical Center in Burbank, hospital nursing supervisor Eric Chew said. They suffered second- and third-degree burns over 30% of their bodies as well inhalation burns caused from breathing the flames, said Susan Marchman, a dispatcher with the Glendale Fire Department.
The men’s names were being withheld until their relatives could be contacted.
None of the 59 elderly patients at Dreier’s Sanitarium in the 1400 block of West Glenoaks Boulevard were injured in the 1:25 p.m. explosion, nor was an evacuation of the building ordered, Marchman said.
The fire was out by the time firefighters arrived several minutes after it was reported, Marchman said. The fire started inside a utility shed in the building’s parking lot and did not spread beyond the air conditioner, she said.
Marchman said one of the injured men works for the sanitarium and the other is employed by a private repair company.
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