Lead photo: An aerial view of a massive fire burning at Medline Industries’ Tracy, CA distribution center. (Credit: ABC10 via YouTube).

A massive fire that broke out June 11 at a Medline Industries distribution center in Tracy, CA destroyed the medical-surgical supply distributor’s approximately 1-million-square-foot facility, with firefighting operations expected to continue for days.

The fire began at about 1 p.m. local time at Medline’s warehouse at 5701 Promontory Parkway, according to the City of Tracy. Fire crews initially responded to reports of a fire on the roof of the facility and found a rapidly developing blaze involving the roof area of the structure. The city said early suppression efforts were hampered by a failure of the building’s private fire water system, which significantly affected initial firefighting operations. High winds, low humidity and elevated temperatures contributed to the fire spreading from the roof into the building’s interior and eventually throughout the facility.

The cause of the fire remains under investigation.

The city said wind-driven embers from the main fire ignited several spot fires in the surrounding area, including fires involving pallet storage areas and trailers near a FedEx facility. Additional spot fires occurred, with mutual aid resources deployed to contain them, and numerous local fire response teams supported fire suppression efforts.

“This is such a unique fire,” Tracy Fire Chief Randall Bradley told local media. “There’s probably been three or four of these in the history of our country, this size of warehouse fire. We may be here for three or four days.”

No injuries have been reported, and Medline said all of its employees and other personnel at the site were accounted for. Local reports said the DC regularly staffs approximately 120 employees. Nearby FedEx and Amazon distribution centers were evacuated as a precaution as firefighters worked to contain the incident and prevent further spread.

See Medline CEO Jim Boyle’s statement below:

“Our priority right now is supporting our team after the fire that impacted our Tracy, CA, Medline distribution facility on Thursday, June 11. We remain incredibly grateful that all Medline employees and on-site personnel were safely evacuated and accounted for,” Medline said in a June 13 update. “We have connected with nearly all affected employees and are offering onsite and local support, resources including financial support and counseling services, and continued communication as we work through next steps together. We are committed to robustly supporting our local employees during this time, and are identifying opportunities to return to work in the near term.”

Medical Supply Chain Impact

Bagley added that some trucks loaded with medical supplies avoided damage from the fire, and that crews are working to determine how to best distribute those goods to Medline’s hospital customers.

More broadly, the loss of such a major distribution center is expected to disrupt the flow of the medical-surgical products that Medline carries for at least the short-term.

“There’s a lot of medical equipment that are loaded up on those trucks that those hospitals and medical facilities are relying upon,” Bagley continued. This devastating fire is going to affect eCommerce throughout the nation, definitely on the western part of the United States, as this was the main distribution center for all medical supplies.”

Meanwhile, a June 12 statement from Medline spoke to the company’s logistics resiliency and flexibility:

“The Tracy facility is part of Medline’s expansive distribution network, and specifically a local distribution center largely serving parts of Northern California. Medline’s supply chain is designed with resiliency, scale and flexibility at its core. Immediately following this incident, Medline activated a command center and a network contingency plan and began incorporating secondary and tertiary distribution centers. Product distribution previously supported by the Tracy facility has been reassigned and it is in the process of being deployed to other facilities within our regional network to help maintain service and support customer needs.”

Medline added June 13 that it has boosted regional staffing, inventory and transportation capacity through increased use of MedTrans trucks, third-party carriers and truck relay operations to accelerate product movement throughout the impacted region.

Northfield, IL-based Medline is the largest provider of medical-surgical products and supply chain solutions serving all points of care, according to the company. Medline reported full-year 2025 net sales of $28.4 billion, up 11.5% from 2024, and net income of $1.2 billion. The company employs more than 45,000 people worldwide and operates in more than 100 countries. Medline’s broader operating footprint includes more than 29 million square feet of warehousing globally.

The Tracy facility was one of Medline’s largest West Coast distribution operations and served as a major Northern California hub for medical products and supplies. AP noted that Medline supplies products including latex gloves, masks, surgical instruments and other medical supplies, and that the Tracy operation played a key role in distributing medical supplies during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The loss of the Medline facility follows another major distribution center fire earlier this year. On April 7, a six-alarm fire destroyed a 1.2-million-square-foot Kimberly-Clark toilet paper distribution center in Ontario, CA. Authorities later arrested an employee of a third-party logistics provider operating the facility on suspicion of arson.