A woman gravely injured in a South Los Angeles house fire, died Monday evening at a local hospital.

The Los Angeles Fire Department was summoned at 5:07 PM on September 28, 2020 to 2508 South 9th Avenue in Jefferson Park, where firefighters arrived quickly to find fire showing from a 3,324 square-foot two story highly modernized Craftsman style home with an extensive addition.     

As firefighters extended hose lines to offensively battle the flames, they came across an elderly female resident seated in a patio area, who had sustained extreme burn injury. A team of Firefighter/Paramedics began immediate care on scene, and during transport to an area hospital, where the woman died shortly after arrival.

With both the original and remodeling construction of the 109 year-old structure leading to rapid fire spread in concealed spaces, the building soon began to fail, leading firefighters to make a transition to defensive operations, with the external application of large-bore hose streams as the fire continued to extend through the seriously compromised structure. 

Ninety-four firefighters under the command of Assistant Chief Jaime Moore confined the fire within the structure, extinguishing the flames in just 69 minutes.

One of the first arriving firefighters, who worked boldly at the forefront of flames for more than an hour, was treated at the scene for extreme exertion before being taken to an area hospital for a clinical assessment. He was subsequently cleared for return to duty.     

The well-kept home was equipped with functional smoke alarms as required by law, but did not feature optional residential fire sprinklers.  

A positive identification of the dead woman, as well as the cause, time and manner of her death will be determined by the Los Angeles County Department of Medical Examiner-Coroner. 

Four family members displaced by the fire declined assistance from the American Red Cross, and will seek their own accommodations. 

Monetary loss to the heavily damaged structure is still being tabulated. The cause of the fire remains under active investigation. 

Dispatched Units: AR1 AR2 BC1 BC11 BC705 BC706 CM22 CM32 E15 E215 E226 E227 E229 E26 E294 E3 E34 E68 E94 EA1 EM1 EM13 HR3 RA26 RA34 RA826 RA827 RA834 RA94 T15 T26 T27 T29 T94 TO34 UR27 UR88