A towering pile of scrap metal caught fire at a Fontana recycling facility Wednesday morning, with crews battling a second-alarm blaze as Santa Ana winds pushed the flames toward neighboring businesses. The fire was burning in the 14000 block of Slover Avenue, with nearby streets closed as officials urged drivers to steer clear of the area.
Crews reported that the fire involved a large metal debris pile at the recycling facility, according to NBC Los Angeles. The outlet identified the blaze as a second-alarm commercial structure fire centered at 14187 Slover Avenue, with crews continuing their attack on the flames. Winds in the area were estimated at about 25 mph, fanning the fire and complicating efforts to keep it contained.
Those same winds were pushing the fire south, raising concern that it could spread to adjacent commercial facilities, per the same report. CAL FIRE/Riverside County Fire Department
amplified word of the ongoing attack on the structure fire, describing a recycling facility burning alongside the large metal debris pile and noting that the fire had put nearby commercial buildings at risk.
Red Flag Conditions Fueling the Flames
The fire broke out amid a stretch of elevated fire danger across the region, with warm temperatures, low humidity and strong winds in the forecast through the end of the week, the station reported. Those conditions are expected to intensify: the National Weather Service issued a high wind watch for the San Bernardino and Riverside County Valleys running from 6 a.m. Thursday through 8 p.m. Friday, according to the Press-Enterprise.
The watch calls for northeast winds of 25 to 35 mph with gusts up to 55 mph, and forecasters warned that gusts near the Cajon Pass could top 60 mph, the paper reported. That kind of wind event, arriving so soon after a major fire already fed by Santa Ana gusts, underscores just how combustible the week has become for the Inland Empire.
A History of Trouble at Recycling Facilities
This is not the first time a fire has broken out at this same Slover Avenue address. Back on June 28, 2010, San Bernardino County firefighters responded to a blaze at Ecology Auto Parts Inc., the recycling yard then operating at 14187 Slover Ave., according to the Press-Telegram. That fire sent dark clouds of smoke into the sky above the business, and witnesses said it was under control by roughly 3:30 p.m. the same day.
Fires at recycling facilities have become a growing national problem. Publicly reported incidents jumped 58%, from 272 in 2016 to 430 in 2024, according to data compiled by Fire Rover and cited by Resource Recycling. The outlet reported a record-breaking 104 incidents in just the first quarter of 2025 alone, and pointed to lithium-ion batteries as a persistent hazard, since they can be crushed or punctured on tipping floors and ignite nearby flammable material.
The scale of damage such fires can cause has been significant elsewhere in the country. More than 5,000 fires occur at materials recycling facilities nationwide every year, according to a 2024 National Waste & Recycling Association report cited by Exponent. The firm noted that a 2016 fire at a materials recycling facility in Plano, Texas, cost more than $30 million to repair and reopen, illustrating the financial toll these incidents can leave behind.
Firefighters continued their attack on the Fontana blaze, which threatened nearby facilities. Drivers were still being asked to avoid the closed streets around the recycling facility as crews continued their attack on the fire.
