Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass
More than 30 workers escaped injury Wednesday night after a partial tunnel collapse at a subterranean construction site in the Wilmington neighborhood of Los Angeles.
The Los Angeles Fire Department was dispatched at 7:58 p.m. on July 9 to the Los Angeles Effluent Outfall Tunnel Project near 1701 Figueroa Street. Initial reports indicated that up to 15 workers might have been trapped several miles inside the 18-foot-diameter tunnel, prompting the LAFD to declare a major emergency tunnel rescue. Over 100 responders, including Urban Search and Rescue teams, hazardous materials specialists, drones, and nearly two dozen ambulance teams were deployed.
Construction officials took a head count and determined more than 30 workers were trapped along a nearly six-mile stretch of the tunnel, though several were on the “safe side” of the collapse, which was found to only be partial. A 12- to 15-foot-high mound of soil and debris was partially blocking the passage…