Air Quality Advisory Covering Pasadena Extended Through Monday as Boyle Heights Fire Smoke Lingers

Air quality across the San Gabriel Valley, including Pasadena, remained under a particle pollution advisory Monday as smoke from a stubborn Boyle Heights warehouse fire continued to drift across the region, the South Coast Air Quality Management District said.

The agency extended the advisory — which it stressed is not a shelter-in-place order — through 12:30 p.m. Monday, June 22, after fine-particle pollution reached levels rated “Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups” to “Very Unhealthy” since Saturday night across central Los Angeles County, the San Gabriel Valley, the eastern San Fernando Valley and the northwest San Bernardino Valley.

For Pasadena-area residents, recent readings have hovered in the Moderate range on the federal Air Quality Index, with fine particles the main pollutant, though levels can rise and fall quickly as winds shift the smoke.

The district’s Monday-morning forecast called for smoke impacts north and east of the fire, including the San Gabriel Valley.

The AQMD advised people in affected areas to limit exposure by staying indoors with windows and doors closed, to avoid vigorous physical activity, and to run air conditioning or an air purifier while avoiding swamp coolers and whole-house fans that draw in outside air.

LAFD Capt. Branden Silverman urged residents to take precautions.

“No smoke is good smoke,” Silverman said. “We know that people are being affected by this in our city as well as LA County’s jurisdiction, and we do want you to take precautions to avoid that smoke whenever possible.”

Dr. Ali Jamehdor, an emergency room physician at St. Mary Medical Center, told NBC Los Angeles that people in affected areas should avoid high-intensity outdoor workouts and that those with underlying conditions should pause outdoor exercise.

“It really is something where if you can smell it, those are particles that are going to be going in your lungs,” Jamehdor said.

The smoke traces to a fire that broke out around 2:30 p.m. Wednesday, June 17, on the roof of a Lineage Logistics cold-storage warehouse in the 1400 block of South Los Palos Street in Boyle Heights, where flames started in a solar-panel array before moving into the nearly 500,000-square-foot structure. By Sunday, the Los Angeles Fire Department reported significant progress, and Chief Jaime Moore said he expected the smoke to linger only a few more days.

“I would anticipate this smoke for about two more days, possibly three, but now we’re going to extinguish the fire,” Moore said.

Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency Saturday, June 20, and Mayor Karen Bass issued a local emergency declaration the same day. “This is about prevention. This is about protecting our public’s health,” Bass said. No injuries have been reported.

Air monitoring by the AQMD has shown particulate matter generally near background levels, with brief, seconds-long spikes of bromine and chlorine that the district said remained below short-term health thresholds, and no significant levels of toxic metals. Lineage, the facility’s operator, said in a statement that it pumped ammonia out of the building and transported it offsite, and officials reported no measurable ammonia in the surrounding community. The company said it believes the fire started during testing by contractors working on the rooftop solar array; the cause remains under investigation.

Residents can check real-time conditions for their neighborhood at aqmd.gov/AQImap or on the federal AirNow service, and follow fire updates at lafd.org/alerts. The AQMD said it would issue an update if additional information became available.