Eastbound 134 Freeway reopens after fuel spill

Authorities have reopened a one-mile stretch of the eastbound Ventura (134) Freeway after closing it for five hours Thursday when a tanker truck overturned near the Bob Hope Drive offramp, spilling gasoline onto the road and into a nearby park.

Officers diverted traffic off the freeway at Pass Avenue and other surface streets beginning about 10:20 a.m. after the tanker began gushing fuel onto the highway, according to the California Highway Patrol.

The tanker was carrying about 4,500 gallons of gasoline, hundreds of gallons of which spilled out across the freeway into storm drains and down onto Johnny Carson Park, Burbank Fire Capt. Ron Bell said.

Puddles of the fuel sprung up across the park and nearby streets as Hazmat crews from Burbank and Glendale fire departments worked to clean up the spill. None of the gasoline seeped into the L.A. River, Bell said. No injuries were reported.

The driver of the truck, which was pulling a trailer containing two tanks of fuel, told authorities that he felt the back-end fishtailing about 10:17 a.m. before going down, CHP Officer Ming-Yang Hsu said.

Officials emptied the tanks and turned them upright before mopping up the spill. The lanes about 3:45 p.m. but the Bob Hope Drive offramp was to be closed through the night.

— Veronica Rocha contributed to this report.

FOR THE RECORD: This corrects an earlier version that had the size of the spill at 1,500 gallons.