July 10, 2025

LA County Sanitation Districts will examine cause of collapse

Hahn speaks to workers evacuated from the partially collapsed tunnel in Wilmington on Wednesday night

Wilmington, CA – Last night, the partial collapse of a tunnel being bored as part of the Clearwater Project by the Los Angeles County Sanitation Districts temporarily trapped 27 workers, with four others later entering the tunnel to assist the trapped workers. All 31 workers were eventually safely evacuated from the tunnel. Los Angeles County Supervisor Janice Hahn, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass, and Los Angeles City Councilmember Tim McOsker rushed to the scene and spoke to the rescued workers after their evacuation. Work on the project has been halted pending an investigation of the cause of the collapse.

Supervisor Hahn, who serves on boards of directors for LA County Sanitation Districts, released the following statement:

“We are blessed that all of those men made it out and made it home to their families. Most people in the Harbor Area communities didn’t even realize that this tunnel was being bored beneath them, but these men go to work every night to build this critical infrastructure project for our region. I am so grateful that they are home safe tonight.

As the sanitation district we will be looking into exactly what caused this, and will do everything we can to prevent anything else like this from happening again.”