THOUSAND OAKS : Auto Crash Sparks $260,000 Store Fire
A woman who accidentally drove her station wagon into a print shop Friday ruptured a natural gas line and triggered a blaze at a Thousand Oaks shopping center.
The blaze caused $260,000 damage to the building and its contents, fire officials said.
Kim Luong, 33, of Simi Valley lost control of her car as she attempted to park behind the New Style print shop at 1378 Thousand Oaks Blvd., Ventura County Sheriff’s Deputy Jerry Lawrence said.
Luong and her four passengers were not injured in the crash, but a spark from her car’s engine ignited the leaking gas and started a fire inside the shop, County Fire Marshal Jim Smith said. The fire was contained about 40 minutes after it started at 11:49 a.m.
Customers and workers at the shopping center said they heard a crash, then saw the fire and ran out of the stores. Two stores, the New Horizons children’s bookstore and the Discovery Playhouse day-care center, were filled with children.
“I knew it was going to explode,†said Steve Boniface, a handyman who was working at one of the stores. “We started grabbing all the kids.â€
Firefighters evacuated about 50 people from the shopping center. Sheriff’s deputies shut down a section of Thousand Oaks Boulevard for more than three hours to clean up the damage.
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