Downtown LA Building avoids collapse after large fire

LOS ANGELES - Fire crews worked late Wednesday night to put out a blaze in a boarded up building in downtown Los Angeles Wednesday night. 

Reports of the fire in the building in the 200 block of East 3rd Street came in just after 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, according to the Los Angeles Fire Department. The three-story building was boarded up. 

LAFD declared the fire a major emergency structure fire just after 8 p.m. Crews eventually controlled the fire around 11:30 p.m.

About 135 firefighters battled the fire Wednesday night. The building avoided a collapse, but crews are red-tagging it, LAFD said.

According to fire officials, heat from the fire has spread to the five-story building next door and one unit in that building caught fire, but the building's sprinkler system has kept it from spreading further.

Aerial footage from SkyFox showed at least eight ladders at one point shooting water to fight the fire.

It was not immediately clear what led to the fire.