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By Josie Huang and Tammy Trujillo
Saturday night's huge fire and explosion just outside Little Tokyo left 11 Los Angeles City firefighters hospitalized.
The good news, as L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti said at a news conference late Saturday: "Everybody's going to make it."
On Sunday morning, the fire department said three firefighters had been discharged from the hospital. Eight are still being treated at Los Angeles County+USC Medical Center, including two in critical, but stable, condition.
Firefighters responded to a call at Smoke Tokes Warehouse Distributor on Boyd Street near the intersection with San Pedro about 6:30 p.m. Saturday. After they entered the building, there was what a fire department spokesman called a "significant" explosion.
LAFD Chief Ralph Terrazas said the incident had shaken many in his department. Authorities said the injured firefighters were trying to reach the origin of the fire when the explosion took place.
"A lot of our firefighters were traumatized. I spoke to them directly, and they're holding up. But when one of your own is injured...you can imagine the amount of emotional stress."
Terrazas, speaking at a news conference last night, said what he knew about the lead-up to the explosion was based on an account by a member of Station 9, the home base for all the injured firefighters.
"We'll have a more in-depth significant incident investigation team look at this incident to learn everything possible, so that we can learn from this event and share this information with all our firefighters within the LAFD as well as throughout the region," he said.
Firefighters brought the fire Saturday night under control in about 90 minutes, with more than 230 personnel working the incident.
There was also a 2016 fire at a Smoke Tokes facility just a couple of blocks from the scene of Saturday night's fire. The fire at 330 E. 3rd Street took more than 160 firefighters more than two hours to extinguish. In that incident, firefighters "forced entry into Smoke Tokes" where they found "intense fire in dense and highly flammable storage that included pressurized flammable gas cylinders, several of which were heard to explode."
Smoke Tokes was described as a maker of butane honey oil, which is used for vaping.
Butane is an odorless gas that easily ignites, and it's used to extract THC from cannabis to create a concentrate known as hash oil, the AP reported. The oil is used in vape pens, edibles, waxes and other products. On its website, Smoke Tokes advertises a variety of products including "torches and butane."
"We were all, I think, frightened when we heard the initial news and raced here as quickly as possible," Garcetti said Saturday night. "We got a lot of firefighters that are shaken up. And we have, of course, social workers and our departmental mental health professionals to make sure everybody's okay."
Station 9, where all 11 injured firefighters are based, serves the downtown area, including Skid Row. The station was profiled this year by our friends at KCET, with a behind-the-scenes look at the very busy fire house:
On Sunday morning, the streets near the fire remained closed.
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May 18, 2020 at 12:05AM
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Massive Downtown LA Fire Injures 11 Firefighters And Shakes Many In LAFD - LAist
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