WATER is sprayed on a tank that overheated at an aerospace plant in Garden Grove, Calif., Friday, May 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Ethan Swope)
UPDATE: There’s good news for most of the people affected by the establishment of the evacuation zone created by the toxic gas emergency created at a plastics factory in West Garden Grove.
At a press conference held at 6 p.m. today (Monday), Orange County officials announced that with the danger of an explosion having passed, the evacuation zone zone would be reduced to a perimeter of Orangewood Avenue on the north, Dale Street to the east, Garden Grove Boulevard to the south and Knott Street on the west.
That removes about 35,000 of the people in the zone from the evacuation area; remaining are about 16,000.
Fire officials said that they were going to continue to study the situation with the goal of reducing and eliminating the evacuation zone as soon as complete safety is confirmed
Press conference on evacuation set
A 6 p.m. news conference is scheduled on the subject of reconsidering the evacuation zones established in the wake of the release of toxic gasses at a West Garden Grove plastics factory last week.
The success of a mission inside the plant revealed a drop in the temperatures in an affected tank – vented by a crack – that eliminated the risk of a major explosion.
The news conference will be held at the Orange County Fire Authority’s command center at the Los Alamitos Race Course in Cypress.
President Donald Trump has authorized federal assistance to the state and local efforts to cope with the incident at the GKN Aerospace factory on Western Avenue.
