Some Wilmington residents probably still remember the late-night fire that destroyed a mostly wooden wharf built before World War II at the Port of Los Angeles in September 2014.

Now, the port has completed construction on the $22.7 million Berths 177-182 Wharf Restoration project — located along the East Basin Channel — that has partially replaced the timber wharf that had been extensively damaged more than a decade ago. It was designed in compliance with the port’s seismic code.

The Los Angeles Board of Harbor Commissioners approved the project in September 2023 and construction began two months later. It included constructing approximately 382 linear feet of concrete wharf 62-feet-wide. Work also included slope erosion repair and bollard upgrades.

“The completion of this project on the heels of the catastrophic Eaton and Palisades fires is a stark reminder of the need to rebuild with long-term resiliency as a top priority,” Port of Los Angeles Executive Director Gene Seroka said in a written comment. “We’re proud to deliver this key infrastructure project as steel-handling operations remain uninterrupted.”

The structure was designed and built “with fire prevention in mind,” said Dina Aryan-Zahlan, the port’s deputy executive director of development.

“This port is more than 100 years old,” she added. “Terminal modernization is essential to maintain our competitive edge.”

The project allows terminal operator Pasha Stevedoring & Terminals to continue shipping and receiving of steel products, including coils of sheet metal and wire rods, tubing, piping, rebar and other bulk material, port officials said in a news release announcing the completion of the work.

Pasha’s terminal is a specialized 40-acre steel-handling facility with covered on-dock warehouses that comprise a 116,000 square-foot transit shed. The Port of Los Angeles is the largest steel-handling port on the West Coast.

Pasha operates two marine terminals at the Port of Los Angeles, including the site of the Green Omni Terminal Project, which demonstrates a full range of zero- and near-zero emissions equipment and vehicles.

Construction was completed by Reyes/Larison Joint Venture of Pomona.

The overnight fire that destroyed the original wharf in 2014 caused one school to be evacuated the next day because of air quality and posed a massive challenge to firefighters. It was contained overnight but the thick pilings covered with petroleum substances smoldered and sent thick smoke into the air.

The World War II-era wharf had wood pylons coated in creosote, which caused heavy black smoke to billow across the port. All firefighters were wearing breathing apparatuses to guard against fumes from materials used to coat the pylons, according to the initial news report.

The fire was first reported as burning in a wharf under the large building at Berth 179, near Fries Avenue, at a steel dock at about 6:30 p.m.

Four employees in the building were evacuated and workers on tugboats moved large ships away from the blaze. Two large cargo ships and some smaller boats were moved to safety.

Firefighters aboard five Los Angeles city fire boats and two Long Beach fire boats battled the blaze, along with scuba divers in the water. The wharf was described as 800 feet long and 50 feet wide, with a largely concrete, 50-by-1,000-foot warehouse building sitting on top.

At one point, the fire extended along the entire wharf. Some of the heavy timber had multiple layers of beams, some as large as 18 inches long and 12 inches thick.

Heavy equipment, manual labor and chain saws were needed to create a fire break that kept the blaze from extending to the north.