Pike National Forest -- Blackened tree stumps and new flowers cover thousands of acres of what used to be a healthy forest.

It was on June 8, 2002 that a small campfire mushroomed into the state's biggest wildfire ever.

Some 138,000 acres burned in the blaze that took three weeks to bring under control. Remarkably, no one was killed in the blaze.

Jack Starshak was fishing on the South Platte River when the fire broke out.

On Friday he told 7NEWS, "It was scary. You didn't know what to do. My favorite tavern burned down and three of my friends' homes burned down."

The fire devastated the South Platte River and many businessmen feared it might be the end of trout fishing near the town of Deckers.

Rich Speer manages a fly fishing shop in Deckers. He said, "The river smelled. It smelled of fire, which was hard to imagine."

Terry Barton, a U.S. Forest service employee admitted to starting the fire. She is now serving time in a federal prison.

It will be centuries before the forest returns to the condition it was on June 7, 2002 -- the day before a distraught Forest Service worker started what scientists believe to be the worst wildfire in the southern Rockies in at least 700 years.

On Sunday, June 9, 2002, the fire raced 19 miles in 13 hours, a freakish explosion of energy so hot it sparked advance fires a mile ahead of its front line and sent waves of heat to 21,000 feet.

Metro-area skies turned apocalyptic-yellow, and ash floated downtown, triggering air quality warnings.

That, plus prolonged drought, created a time bomb that finally went off.

"We're 600 years away from a full ecological recovery, full growth, across the landscape," said Merrill Kaufmann, a researcher emeritus at the Forest Service's 14-state Rocky Mountain Research Station, headquartered in Fort Collins.

That's because ponderosa pine, the keystone tree species at the 6,000 to 8,000-foot elevation zone covered by the Hayman footprint, takes decades to mature enough to produce seeds.

Even then, the heavy seeds travel only a short distance - perhaps a few football fields - from the tree.

Those new trees must grow for as long as 30 years before producing more seed, and nudging the forest across the land. So forest managers determined that more human intervention was needed to recreate the thinner forest conditions that existed before human settlement - conditions that limit catastrophic events such as the Hayman Fire.

"I just think (the Hayman) opened our eyes to how severe the forest conditions are. They're extremely out of whack compared to where they should be," Dennis said.

"We were all shocked at the extent not only of the Hayman, but (several other 2002) fires. They burned more intensely and covered more acres that we ever would have imagined."

Foresters are generally upbeat about the Hayman burn zone's future.

Studies have found native plants doing surprisingly well, with strong growth and more diversity in areas than before the fire.

"It's rebounding," said Dick Furtak, who lives near West Creek. He revels in the small groups of deer that wander on his land but laments his surroundings.

"A bunch of black sticks sticking up out of the ground," he said.