Shipment of Supplies Sent to New Mexico to Help Wildfire Victims

On April 6th, a series of controlled burns were taking place in New Mexico, and even through the weather at the time was within the parameters for controlled burns, the strong erratic winds that took place were not expected that started that afternoon. Those winds started additional spot fires outside of the controlled burn boundaries and at 4:30 pm on the 6th what started as a controlled burn was declared the Hermits Peak Fire, located 12 miles Northwest of Las Vegas, NM. The Hermits Peak Fire was burning through steep, rough terrain, so was a big challenge for firefighters. Ten days later, April 16th, the Calf Canyon Fire started, and the cause for the Calf Canyon Fire is still under investigation. On April 23rd the two blazes joined together, and now the Hermits Peak-Calf Canyon Fire has become the largest wildfire on record in New Mexico, burning 299,565 acres as of Tuesday May 17th, and is 26% contained. This fire has been fueled by unusually warm, windy and dry weather the last few weeks, as it has spread. Many instances of lightning strikes with no rain took place.
Our Associate Director over New Mexico, Brian Spicer, was quickly in touch with the Mountain View Church of Christ in Las Vegas, NM, offering our help. Several times the last couple of weeks the leaders at Mountain View thought it was time for us to send them supplies, but the status of the fire was changing daily. 3,800 homes in Northern New Mexico were ordered to evacuate, and another 5,600 were under voluntary evacuation. Many residents had left the area to go live with friends and family in nearby states until the evacuation order is lifted.

Tomorrow morning, after up to 40 days for some families to be away from their homes, some areas will begin allowing families to return to see what is left. Tomorrow morning, a 53’ trailer full of food, personal hygiene, infant care, new clothing and new shoes, along with pallets of water, cleaning supplies will be unloaded by members of the the Mountain View church , at their building, to be distributed to those affected by this fire.
We do not know the total number of primary family homes that have been destroyed, but we have additional shipments of supplies ready to send to the area now. We stay prepared to help disaster areas across the US and US territories, we don’t wait for the disasters to happen before we start getting ready, we stay in a state of readiness at our 87,000 square foot warehouse. We have the supplies, the volunteers to organize and pack them, and the trucks and trailers to get the supplies where they’re needed. We thank you for your support and prayers for this work.

Please pray for all of these families that were in the path of this fire, and for the thousands that have been fighting these fires in New Mexico for six weeks.