Worker Injured in Explosion Ignited by Flammable Fumes

A 32-year-old Saticoy man was in guarded but stable condition Thursday night at Ventura County Medical Center after suffering second-degree burns on his arms and face when an explosion blew out a door and part of a wall in a room he was refinishing.

Jesse Mendez was painting and refinishing a vacant apartment at 11150 Citrus Drive in Ventura about 1:49 p.m. when a mixture of flammable gasses and air trapped inside a closed bathroom was ignited by an electrical source and exploded, said Battalion Chief Michael Lavery of the Ventura County Fire Department.

Mendez had applied a chemical coating to a fiberglass shower enclosure in the apartment and then entered the adjacent bedroom to clean the paint spray unit with acetone, Lavery said. The vapors from the chemical coating were flammable.

An investigation is underway to determine whether a light switch, light or paint spray power unit was the electrical source that sparked the explosion and fire, authorities said.

“It was a pretty powerful explosion,” Lavery said. “It blew out the windows and blew the bathroom door right off its hinges. It knocked out part of the wall and put a hole in the ceiling.”

Maintenance workers at the apartment complex controlled the flames from the explosion with portable fire extinguishers. Tony Lopez, 24, suffered minor cuts on his arm when he broke the glass to get a fire extinguisher, authorities said.

Ventura firefighters extinguished the fire, which caused about $3,000 in structural damage to the apartment.

Increased ventilation in the bathroom where the chemical coating was used and cleaning the paint sprayer outdoors may have alleviated the danger, Lavery said.