personal anecdote.
growing up in the big H, worked on the chemical plants and refineries on the ship channel. was up in the top of a unit with another engineering dept guy taking some measurements for a rework. noticed it was getting hazy, though it was my breathing air mask getting fogged. looked down 3 floors thru the gratings, saw flames shooting out the side of a valve.
learned why there was a large pea gravel pit around the base of the stairs on the level outside exit. it was for when playing superman and not breaking your ankles when you bailed from the 3rd floor.
in the time it took to yell at my buddy, get his attention, and we made it 30 yards across the floor to the exit side door, an operator stuck his head out of the control room, immediately slammed the door closed behind him, the BIG RED BUTTON got pushed, setting off the klaxons, and everybody scrambled upwind, looking like ant pourring out of a mound. nasty shit in that building, learned that nickel carbonyl was a deadly, slow acting poison. had to pee in a bottle 2x a day for a week until given the all clear.
it was a weekly occurrence that at one plant or another, something broke or caught on fire, just most of the time it was immediately contained and extinguished.
looking at the vid it looks like the prob in LA was at the expansion loops, which are put in on pipe runs between places that are hot, going to places that are cooler, that allow the piping to absorb the thermal expansion and contraction, so those get the most stress.