Overview
- A roughly 1 million‑square‑foot Medline warehouse in Tracy burned on June 11, forcing evacuations, prompting a local state of emergency, and exposing failures in in‑building sprinklers and private hydrants that hampered firefighting.
- Medline has leased about 1.6 million square feet in Northern California, securing a 925,000‑square‑foot Tracy facility for near‑term use and a 709,000‑square‑foot Stockton center slated to open in January 2027.
- The company says it is running a network contingency plan that ships products 24/7, routes orders through secondary and tertiary centers and a Southern California warehouse, and is increasing inventory and transportation capacity to serve customers.
- Hospitals and local suppliers have seen varied effects from the outage, with some systems reporting minimal disruption and others reporting back orders and shortages of items such as suture kits, IV lines and hygiene supplies while deliveries from Medline have taken three to four days instead of one.
- Cleanup at the condemned Tracy site is ongoing, there is no firm timeline for full normalization, and Medline plans further California expansion including a Perris build that would bring its state footprint close to 5 million square feet by mid‑2027.