Small Fire Erupts During Cleanup of UCI Blaze

As workers cleaned up debris Thursday, a small flash fire broke out in the same UC Irvine chemistry lab that erupted in flames three days earlier when a doctoral student’s experiment blew up.

The latest fire began about noon as workers were putting material into containers, said Tom Vasich, a UCI spokesman. The fire lasted just a few seconds when sodium reacted with smoldering debris.

A worker quickly doused the flames with a fire extinguisher.

The Orange County Fire Authority was called but left within half an hour, Vasich said.

Through the day, workers dressed in yellow hazardous-materials suits and gas masks came in and out of Frederick Reines Hall. Employees trained in use of hazardous materials were going into Reines to retrieve items such as keys, wallets and computers that faculty, students and staff left when they evacuated the building Monday.

Cy Fujimoto, the grad student whose experiment went awry, was released Thursday night from the burn unit at UCI Medical Center in Orange. Fujimoto, who suffered burns over 8% to 10% of his body, probably will not need skin grafts, a spokeswoman for the center said.

Firefighter Mike Long, who was hospitalized Monday with breathing difficulty and heat exhaustion, was released Thursday from Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian in Newport Beach.

Meanwhile, UCI and health officials were awaiting the results of air samples before allowing students and faculty to return to Reines Hall.

The fire did no damage to the west wing of the building, which houses the physics labs, Vasich said. Officials hope that side of Reines can be used today if air samples are OK.

Vasich said the university hopes to reopen the third, fourth and fifth floors of Reines Hall on Sunday.

He said officials still don’t know when professors and students can head back to the second floor, where the fire occurred. Once they return, the scope of damage to sophisticated electrical equipment and research can be determined.