City and state investigators continue to monitor an area in Old West Lawrence where gasoline has pooled underground, Lawrence Fire Chief Mark Bradford said Friday.

“This is a process that will take several weeks, if not months, to correct,” Bradford said after an online chat on the Journal-World’s Web site.

Bradford told the online audience that his department and others were working to assure the area of Ninth and Louisiana streets was safe.

As of Friday morning, the sanitary sewer and storm water systems were free of combustible materials, he wrote.

An underground fuel tank leak at the Presto Convenience Store, 602 W. Ninth St., is suspected of causing a fire Sunday that destroyed a five-apartment house at 838 La. The house is across the street, east of Presto.

Kansas Department of Health and Environment officials are requiring that the Presto fuel tanks be removed on Monday.

“They have found significant contamination of the soil around those tanks, even though the pressure tests of the tanks and the service piping have all been approved,” Bradford said. “There is still obviously a lot of fuel there. Upwards to 1,000 gallons of gasoline have been removed from that site.”

He said KDHE was installing monitoring wells throughout the neighborhood to find where the gasoline had seeped.

Officials also will study historical data to try to find whether old fuel tanks had been left underground when they went out of service.

“There may be a spill in the area that nobody is aware of,” Bradford said.

He said daily monitoring by the city’s utilities department and Lawrence-Douglas County Fire & Medical would continue to ensure the area’s safety.

During the chat, Bradford also responded to other questions related to the department. To read the transcript, see a video interview and make comments, go to www2.ljworld.com/news/chats/newsmakers/.