A fire has broken out at a Chevron oil refinery just outside Los Angeles, sending towering flames into the night air that were visible for kilometres.

Officials in El Segundo, California, urged people to stay indoors on Thursday night, although they said there was no immediate threat to public safety and no evacuations had been ordered.

There were no injuries at the Chevron El Segundo Refinery and all personnel were accounted for, the company said in a statement, adding that a monitoring system indicated the fire did not move beyond the facility's fence line.

The statement did not say what caused the fire.

LA County Supervisor Holly Mitchell told KCAL-TV that fire crews had contained the blaze to one section of the refinery.

California Governor Gavin Newsom's office said it was monito

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