Los Angeles County firefighters worked for several hours to put out a massive blaze that erupted at an under-construction housing project for low-income veterans early Wednesday.
The five-story building in East Los Angeles caught fire at about 1 a.m., and around 150 Los Angeles County firefighters responded the call, KCAL-TV reports. While crews battled the blaze, flames brought down scaffolding outside the building, and video footage captured the crashing debris.
"“We have had some of that scaffolding collapse," Los Angeles County Fire Inspector Sean Ferguson told KCAL. "Luckily no one’s been injured in that. We’ve been fortunate, a lot of that scaffolding has collapsed inward onto the building itself.”
The fire spread to the nearby historic Unique Theater, which was built in the 1920s. A neighboring single-story home also was damaged.
Firefighters eventually had the blaze under control by 7:30 a.m., and they continued looking for hot spots for several hours.
“Unlike other fires where we can get up close and get a hose line right to it, this is a little bit trickier here, just due to the fact that it’s under construction, it’s unsafe to get our members up in there,” Ferguson said.
Authorities detained a boy as a person of interest in connection with the fire, Investigators are trying to determine the cause of the blaze.
