Late into the night, a North Hollywood business erupted in flames, destroying the building.

At 1:01AM on April 16, 2020, the Los Angeles Fire Department responded to a reported structure fire in the 12000 block of W Victory Blvd in North Hollywood.  The first arriving fire companies found a large, one, story commercial building with fire showing.

An immediate offensive operation ensued; fire attack worked to make entry into the building while the truck company headed to the roof for vertical ventilation.  However, approximately 10 minutes into the incident, the lack of progress towards the seat of the fire and concern for the structural integrity of the structure caused the incident commander to order the transition to the defensive mode.

With all crews out of the building and off the roof, master streams were put into place. Ladder pipes and large hand lines poured copious amounts of water into the fire from the exterior. While the bulk of the fire was extinguished approximately one hour into the incident, difficult to reach pockets of fire remained and continued to flare up.

The 8,111 square foot building, built in 1957, was doing business as a ‘dollar store’ and had a significant fire load (amount of contents inside the structure). This environment presented challenges to the firefighters as they worked to safely reach the seat of the fire.

Nearly 100 firefighters, under the command of Assistant Chief Corey Rose, battled through the night. At 3:06AM (two hours and four minutes into the incident), the incident clock was turned off and firefighters continued working to address the remaining hot spots. 

LAFD Arson and Counter-Terrorism section responded, per protocol for a fire of this size, to conduct the cause investigation and it remains an active investigation.  No injuries were reported.

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