Outside Fire Station 7 in central Prescott stand 19 long-handled shovels propped up against a chain-link fence adorned with flowers, flags, ribbons and memorabilia - a makeshift memorial to the 19 fallen firemen who called the Arizona town their home.
The fast-growing shrine has become a center for the outpouring of grief over the loss of the young members of the Granite Mountain Hotshots, an elite firefighting team, who died battling a wildfire outside the town of Yarnell on Sunday.
Their deaths turned an otherwise rather ordinary wildfire, one of dozens burning across the western United States, into the most deadly U.S. wildlands blaze in 80 years and left Prescott, the home base of the Hotshots crew, reeling.
At least 1,800 people packed a memorial service on the outskirts of town on Monday.
But the shrine outside the firehouse has offered residents a place to express their emotions.
"It helps a lot. I had to get down here because I couldn't stop crying at home," Missy Acknuff said on Tuesday as she brushed away a tear. She laid down a picture of a firefighter with wings against the fence.
"I want to let their mothers know how proud they should be of them," said Acknuff, who has three sons serving in the military.
As offerings outside the firehouse piled up, some 500 firefighters labored on the outskirts of Yarnell, about 30 miles (48 km) southwest of Prescott, where scores of homes were destroyed in a fierce fire flare-up on Sunday.
The blaze, ignited on Friday by lightning and stoked by strong, erratic winds, has blackened at least 8,400 acres (3,400 hectares) of thick, tinder-dry chaparral, oak scrub and grasslands northwest of Phoenix, authorities said. About 200 structures, most of them homes, were destroyed.
Yarnell and the adjacent town of Peeples Valley, which together are home to roughly 1,000 people, remained evacuated.
Clay Templin, a fire incident commander, told residents at a community meeting that evacuees would probably not be allowed to return to the homes before Saturday.
RESPECT AND GRATITUDE
Christina Ostendorf paid a visit to the Prescott shrine with her mother, sister and daughter, laying two bunches of flowers with hundreds of others brightening the dusty street corner.
"It's very important in teaching my daughter to respect the people who take care of us," she said.
She described the memorial, which grew by the hour on Tuesday with new contributions - T-shirts and caps from distant fire departments, condolence cards, photos, U.S. and Arizona state flags - as an emblem of "hope and community."
"And if according to your will, I have to lose my life, please bless with your protecting hand my children and my wife, read a verse from the "The Firemen's Prayer".
A woman reading it doubled over, sobbing uncontrollably.
An overwhelming sense of gratitude for the fallen men, and firefighters everywhere, was manifest in many of the mementos left at the shrine. Spontaneous cheering and applause burst from bystanders whenever a fire truck passed through the streets.
Prescott, a quintessential western town with an historic past, was once the capital of the Arizona territory in the 1860s, perched in the state's rugged north-central highlands.
Its downtown is dotted with cowboy clothing stores, restaurants and shops but the city's motto, "Welcome to everybody's hometown," seemed at odds with the somber mood of many, as friends and family recalled the idiosyncrasies and tragic ironies of their loved ones who perished in the blaze.
One of them, John Percin, 24, who joined the Hotshots six months ago, had been out of work for some time with a leg injury until rejoining the team last week to fight the Yarnell Hills fire, friends said.
"He was always so energetic about wanting to get in and fight a fire," buddy Levi Weinberger told Reuters. "Right before they all went out that morning, he put up a Facebook post which said, 'pray for me and my brothers while we go and fight this battle.' that was the last thing we heard."
Fire officials say the 19 men were out carving a fire break with hand tools on one flank of the fire Sunday afternoon when strong winds from a thunderstorm abruptly turned the flames back in their direction. They apparently were overtaken by flames in a matter of seconds before they had a chance to seek shelter.
The precise circumstances of the tragedy remained under investigation. (Additional reporting by Brad Poole and David Schwartz; Writing by steve Gorman; Editing by Dina Kyriakidou and Paul Simao)
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