Bomb Scare Closes Freeways

Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies and California Highway Patrol officers created a massive traffic jam in Norwalk on Friday, shutting down portions of two freeways for more than two hours after a backpack abandoned at a Metro line station was thought to be potentially dangerous.

Authorities said they determined that the backpack, which was blown up by a sheriff’s bomb squad, did not contain explosives or other hazardous substances.

“But our response was appropriate,” said Lt. Mike Herek of the sheriff’s Transit Services Bureau. “We want to ensure that the traveling public is safe.”

Herek said a Green Line Metro train operator passed through the Norwalk station several times Friday morning, and each time, he saw a red backpack sitting near the tracks.

“The operator realized it had been sitting there for a couple of hours, and he gave us a call,” Herek said. “We followed our protocols.”

Herek said the protocols call for sealing off a sizable area around any potentially dangerous container the size of the backpack. The station is at the confluence of the 605 and 105 freeways in Norwalk, and that meant closing down a stretch of both freeways, starting about 10 a.m.

“It created a sizable traffic backlog,” he said.

The California Highway Patrol said the 605 Freeway was closed in both directions between Rosecrans Avenue and Imperial Highway, and traffic was shut down on carpool lanes of the 105 Freeway. The closures lasted more than two hours, and officers said the backups stretched for miles on the 605 as frustrated motorists jammed offramps in an attempt to make their way around the logjam.

The Green Line’s Norwalk station was cleared and closed, with trains beginning and ending their runs at the next station to the west, in Downey. The Norwalk station marks the east end of the Green Line, and much of the right-of-way runs down the median of the 105 Freeway.

With the freeway lanes shut down and the Norwalk station closed, the bomb squad was brought in. Using robotic devices, team members examined the backpack. Although the backpack appeared safe, it was blown up as a precaution, Herek said.