City Hall officials have not been able to confirm that the owner of the Culver Ice Arena has agreed to decommission the rink. “We have made several calls and we have not heard back” from owner Michael Karagozian, said City Manager John Nachbar. As of March 5, Nachbar’s staff had not made contact with the property owner.
Recent reports have surfaced indicating that Karagozian, who could not be reached for comment, planned to take the ice rink and its structure out of service after 52 years at the end of last month.
In a special report issued last month, city officials claimed while Karagozian did agree to have the electricity service account transferred to his name so that it would not be turned off, he has refused to accept any responsibility for decommissioning the rink. Experts hired by the city say the rink has anhydrous ammonia as the primary refrigerant in its refrigeration system and before anyone can operate the arena again the cooling system must berepaired.
A refrigeration firm hired by the Takahashi family, which ran the skating school at Culver Ice Arena, disputes those findings.
Anhydrous ammonia can be a very corrosive gas. If released through a rupture in the rink’s cooling system it could be fatal if a person is exposed to the ammonia for a prolonged amount of time, according to Dr. Clark Fuller, the director of thoracic surgery for Saint John’s Heath Center in Santa Monica.
Birds that fly over nearby Ballona Creek could be vulnerable as well.
“[Anhydrous ammonia] has a great affinity for water,” Fuller said.
The popular skating rink has been closed since last month after Karagozian did not renew the lease of the former rink operator, John Jackson.
City officials then hired a team of consultants to conduct inspections of the ice rink.
