Fire Prevention Office Destroyed in Blaze
A county fire prevention office in a building without sprinklers caught fire and burned west of downtown Los Angeles this week.
“It’s not embarrassing unless we find that something in our office caused the fire,” said county Fire Capt. Robert Grafton. “There were no sprinklers in this building and it certainly would have been better to have them.”
The building may have been built before a sprinkler system was required, he added.
Wednesday night’s blaze caused $280,000 damage.
“From time to time office buildings burn,” Grafton said. “We think it’s pretty unfortunate that it happened to us.”
Firefighters were alerted at about 9:55 p.m. They arrived to find the one-story building engulfed in flames, said city fire spokesman Pat Marek.
The firefighters had the blaze out in about 40 minutes, Marek said. There were no injuries and the building was empty, he said.
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