Apple Del Amo in Torrance is temporarily closed, and the reported water damage behind it is unconfirmedApple Del Amo in Torrance is temporarily closed, and the reported water damage behind it is unconfirmed

Apple has temporarily closed Apple Del Amo, its store at the Del Amo Fashion Center in Torrance, California.

The store's page on Apple's website now says it is "temporarily closed due to events beyond our control". It gives no reason and no reopening date, and it lists the store as closed on every day from 14 to 20 October. In place of opening hours it points visitors to Apple's store locator, the online store and Apple's online support for setup, account recovery and repairs. MacRumors, which reported the closure on 14 October, says the store has already been shut for a few days.

What closed the store?

Apple has not said. MacRumors points to comments in a South Bay Reddit thread alleging that the store suffered extensive water damage after a roof leak in the shopping centre. That account is unverified. It comes from anonymous commenters, MacRumors relays it without confirming it, and we found no statement from Apple or the mall and no local news report of a leak. Any outlet repeating the water damage story is repeating those same comments, so for now it is one unconfirmed claim, not several.

Which Apple Stores nearby are open?

The two nearest stores we checked were trading normally on 14 October, according to Apple's own store pages. Apple Manhattan Village, at 3200 Sepulveda Boulevard in Manhattan Beach, lists 10am to 8pm on most days this week. Apple Los Cerritos, in the Los Cerritos Center in Cerritos, lists 10am to 9pm on most days and shorter hours on Sunday. Neither page carries a closure notice.

What should Del Amo customers do now?

Anyone with a Genius Bar booking or an in-store pickup order at Del Amo should check it in the Apple Store app or their confirmation email rather than assume it has been moved, because Apple's page does not say what happens to either. Apple's online support can rebook a repair at another store. The page also offers a session with a Specialist online for anyone who wanted advice before buying.

Our take

The timing is what makes a local closure worth watching. iPhone Duo pre-orders open at 5am Pacific on Friday 16 October and the phone reaches stores on 23 October. Bloomberg's Mark Gurman has reported that Apple plans about 20 Duo demo units for an ordinary Apple Store, and that US stores will set a new Duo to greet its buyer by name on first start. For a 1,999 dollar phone that folds, the store visit is a large part of how Apple intends to sell it, and Torrance currently has no store to visit.

Apple does time store openings to launches. In the UK, Apple SouthGate in Bath reopens on the Duo's launch day after more than three months of refurbishment. That was a planned refit with a date published weeks ahead. Del Amo is the opposite case: unplanned, with no date at all. Whether it is a week of drying out or months of rebuilding depends on how much water, if water is the cause, reached the shop floor, and nobody outside Apple and the mall has said. Apple's wording would cover a burst pipe as readily as a power failure, so it tells us nothing either way, and the closed hours shown to 20 October may simply be the page's default until someone updates it.

For South Bay buyers planning a pre-order on Friday, the safer choice in APPDOOK's judgement is delivery, or pickup at Manhattan Village or Los Cerritos, rather than Del Amo, even if the store page shows it reopening by then. Gurman expects Duo stock to stay tight, and a pickup slot at a store that might not open on launch day is the one outcome worth avoiding. Apple's store page, not Reddit, is where the reopening date will appear first.