New Mexico fire officials reported that as of Monday the Calf Canyon/Hermits Peak fire had reached roughly 311,000 acres in size.

The wildfire is the largest wildfire currently burning in the United States, a KOB 4 news report said this week. The fire continued to approach the Village of Pecos, which prompted fire officials to put the village on 'Set' status.

"Right now we’re feeling a lot better, the people have calmed down a lot," Village of Pecos Mayor Ted Benavidez told KOB 4. "We have tons of fire trucks going through the village in the morning up the mountains. We have tons of resources and the fire has been kept at a minimum, the increase hasn’t been a lot, so that makes us feel better. We’re hoping that we get some rain, that’s what we really need to douse this fire."

On Monday, fire officials announced that they had made great progress in fighting the fire on its eastern front, the news report said. Containing the east side was important because if it passed the line that firefighters had established, wind conditions would have pushed it further down the canyon.

Now that the east side of the fire has been contained, firefighters are going to focus their efforts on the western side by creating containment lines to prevent it from spreading further in that direction.

The wildfire has been burning for more than a month after U.S. Fire Service officials lost control of a prescribed burn.