The Monument Fire

June 2011

The Monument Fire started outside of Sierra Vista, AZ near Hereford, AZ on June 12, 2011! This fire hit home with me as I moved to Sierra Vista during the middle of fifth grade and left there after high school. My Dad, sister, Karisa, and her family still live there as well as many of my good friends! My sister, her husband, four children and dog were evacuated from their home in Hereford for two weeks and went to stay with my dad! The fire went right through their housing area, but left their home untouched. A few friends weren't as fortunate and lost their homes. A second fire started by the name of the Antelope fire right behind my Dad's backyard and he had to be evacuated as well as my sister who was staying with him! It was a scary few weeks for my family and friends. At one point over 12, 000 people were left homeless and in the end over 30, 000 acres burned and 65 homes and businesses were either destroyed or damaged.

I decided that I needed to do something to help and enlisted the help of my wonderful church. Our church was already helping out with donations to the Wallow fire in another part of our state and I asked if we could do something to help the great people of Sierra Vista and the surrounding area! Emails were sent by our Stake church Humanitarian leaders to local church members in the Mesa area and before you knew it my front living room was filled with supplies for the fire fighters and victims of the Monument Fire! I filled my living room three different times with supplies! The first time my sister, Karisa, loaded her suburban and took everything back to Sierra Vista with her. The second and third time my sister, Abby, and her husband, Kelvin, took the supplies down to Sierra Vista!

Thank you to all my family, friends and church members who donated their time and money to help the great people of Sierra Vista during their time of need! It was amazing to see my front living room filled with donations!

This picture was taken of the mountains on fire during the Monument Fire.

This is a great short video that shows many pictures taken during the Monument Fire. I cried watching this!

I was so amazed with all the great donations that were donated by family, friends and church members in the Mesa area that I had to take pictures! All this was from the first round of donation collections!

All this is from the second round for collection of donations!

My brother-in-law, Kelvin, packing the supplies into his trailer to take down to Sierra Vista!

The third round of donations for the Monument Fire!

Kelvin not only filled his trailer with donations, but he also packed his truck down with supplies to take to Sierra Vista! The donation centers were amazed with all the donations from members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in Mesa aka the Mesa Mormons!