More than 3,000 personnel battled at least six wildfires in Colorado on Monday as thousands of people who were evacuated waited to find out when they could return.

Thousands of residents have been evacuated since that fire started June 9, some more than once as firefighters wage a back-and-forth battle.

“I’m kind of anxious to get home,” said Ernest Martinez, one of the residents forced to flee. “And I feel bad for the rest of the dreamers that lost their homes and have to rebuild again.”

The fire, which was 45 percent contained, was sparked by lightning.

A fire near Rocky Mountain National Park destroyed 22 homes and vacation cabins and two outbuildings in the town of Estes Park. The fire has been contained and evacuated residents were allowed to return.

A new fire on Colorado’s Eastern Plains sprouted up Monday afternoon near the tiny, sparsely populated town of Last Chance. The fire had burned an estimated 60 square miles and was 50 percent contained. Nine structures were damaged, including two homes, according to Deanna Herbert, the public information officer for the fire. The town was under mandatory evacuation.

The 2012 fire season is already the state’s worst in a decade. In late March, the Lower North Fork Fire, 25 miles southwest of Denver, killed three people and damaged or destroyed more than two dozen homes. That fire was the result of a prescribed burn that grew out of control after it was set by the State Forest Service.

The weather offered little hope of short-term relief.

A heat wave sent temperatures soaring above 100 degrees in many places Monday. A red flag warning for high fire danger was in effect across most of the state.

Tidwell said Colorado’s fire season is about a month early.

“It’s just because it’s so dry,” he said. “Not unlike New Mexico — they saw very low snowpack, especially in that lower country. Hot, dry winds with dry fuels, you get the ignition and this is what we see.”

The state has banned open campfires and private fireworks. The federal Bureau of Land Management banned campfires and outdoor smoking and imposed other fire restrictions on its land in 21 counties covering most of eastern Colorado.

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Associated Press writers Peter Banda in Fort Collins, Mead Gruver in Cheyenne, Wyo., and Susan Montoya Bryan in Albuquerque, N.M., contributed to this report.