Story highlights Nine communities in Utah are evacuated because of the wildfire threat

Arizona, where temperatures have hovered in triple digits, is under a state of emergency

(CNN) A series of wildfires is blazing across the Southwest as the chance of rain remains low amid a deadly heatwave.

Eighteen large fires are burning in the region, including six in Arizona, three in Utah, three in California, three in New Mexico, two in Nevada and a large one in Oregon. The two biggest wildfires are in southern Arizona and Utah.

Wildfires already have caused far more destruction than usual in the first half of 2017, meteorologist Haley Brink of the CNN Weather Center said. Almost 1 million more acres had burned by Thursday, compared with the 10-year average through June 22.

800 battle Arizona wildfire

The Frye Fire in southern Arizona covered nearly 30,000 acres as of Saturday afternoon and was 29% contained, the forest service at Coronado National Forest said.

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