Carol Mitchem, a victim of wildfire at the Echo Ridge Community, spoke out on the occurrence near Moriarty on April 3. She raised the question as to where the motive behind the fire came from.
"We stick to ourselves, so why bother this neighborhood?" Mitchem asked.
On Sunday, residents were ordered to return home after being told to evacuate due to a wildfire in the Echo Ridge community. According to KOAT 7 News, over 175 acres have been damaged by the fire.
"We still don't know the motive behind all of this — whoever set the fire, you know?" Mitchem asked. "Why would you trigger a neighborhood that really doesn't do anything? We stick to ourselves."
For now, the cause of the fire is still under investigation. However, the New Mexico State Forestry currently has two suspects in custody with New Mexico State Police.
A community of New Mexico residents was affected by the wildfire. The damage amounted to three homes burned and six buildings destroyed.
Richard Phillips, a wildfire victim shared that even though his home was completely obliterated he rushed to prevent his neighbors' house from the same fate.
"Once the fire got too much — we tried to do what we could to stop it from spreading to somebody else's house," Phillips said. "I know the flames got as high as the house next door. We stopped at my house because it was basically a lost cause at that point. Everything was all in the house, and now there's nothing."
Additional residents of Echo Ridge banded together as a community to help fight against the fire and protect each other from the smoke. They began taking action prior to the fire department's arrival.
Echo Ridge resident, Josh Carroll shared that his wife alerted him of the wildfire. He, then immediately gathered with the community to alleviate the widespread fire.
"I got a phone call from my wife, and she said, 'Everything's on fire.' So, we rushed over here," Carroll said. "We got here before the fire department did. We already had a bunch of community out here that were putting out fires, trying to keep fires from spreading to other houses. We all got buckets, we got hoses, we got rakes, shovels. We did what we could."
Although the officials are still on alert for high winds, the Echo Ridge Fire, Hilton Fire, and Line Shack Fire reported the fire as currently "stable." There are no threats to structures and buildings according to New Mexico State Forestry officials.
However, the tragedy has left families heartbroken. Phillips shared that he has lost memorabilia of late family members.
"My family, mother, my grandparents — they passed recently, all I had left was their pictures," Phillips said. "I'm not sure where to begin, you know?
In addition, he is concerned about what steps there are to take next. Phillips is focused on rebuilding and moving forward from the tragedy.
"We're a low-income neighborhood," Phillips said. "When a tragedy like this happens, we don't know where to go from here. I was uninsured, and I'm not what help is out there yet. I'll check on some resources, but right now, it's trying to rebuild what we got."
As he reflected on the wildfire, 11-year-old Matthew Lofton shared that the experience was frightening. Yet, he expressed his appreciation for all of the helping hands. Despite losing material things, he still had a lot to be grateful for.
"It was pretty scary," Lofton said. "I was scared, but the community helped us. Thank you to the firefighters as well. We can always replace everything, but we can't replace our lives."
