Esparto Fire Chief Curtis Lawrence called the situation “very complex and risky”.
“There were, you know, reports of a large debris field of large pieces of shrapnel spread out across a large area,” he told a press conference.
“So we maintained a wide perimeter of a wide berth around this area today into the day, and we kept our responders in a safe location.”
The authorities’ cautious response angered some relatives of the victims.
A woman interrupted the press conference and complained she had no information about her boyfriend and two brothers-in-law who were among the missing.
She accused the firefighters of not “focusing on the people who are stuck in the warehouse, possibly dead”.
“People have possibly lost their lives because of you guys not doing your job well enough,” the woman, who did not identify herself, said.
After the accident, several nearby towns announced they would have to cancel their fireworks displays scheduled for Friday, July 4, when America celebrates its Independence Day.
“This type of incident is very rare, as facilities like this are required to not only follow our stringent California pyrotechnic requirements, but also federal explosive storage requirements,” Cal Fire said in its statement.
- Agence France-Presse
