A California firefighter has been arrested and accused of setting five blazes in the state's wine country, even as his fellow firefighters battle flames that have consumed almost a million acres and forced thousands of evacuations in the state this year.

Robert Hernandez, a 38-year-old fire apparatus engineer with Cal Fire, the state’s main firefighting agency, was arrested on suspicion of setting fires on forest land near the Northern California towns of Geyserville, Healdsburg and Windsor between Aug. 15 and Sept. 14.

A California firefighter, Robert Matthew Hernandez, has been arrested for allegedly setting five fires in the state's wine country. Hernandez, an engineer with Cal Fire, was detained on suspicion of arson.