A 14-year-old boy was arrested in connection with a brush fire in Saugus that threatened 50 homes in Saugus on Sunday, scorched about 40 acres and injured two Los Angeles County Fire Department camp crew members.

Police found and detained the boy and his friend, also 14, after matching descriptions given to them by witnesses who called 911 to report the fire, according to Capt. Mike Parker of the Sheriff’s Department’s Headquarters Bureau.

The friend was released after the other boy admitted that he started the fire when he dropped a barbecue lighter while trying to ignite his marijuana pipe, Parker said. The teenagers, both from Saugus, attempted to stomp out the flames, but they ran away when the blaze grew.

Parker said firefighters found a barbecue lighter near where the fire started.

Flames came within a few yards of some of the homes on Brookview Terrace, one of three streets that were evacuated. The fire erupted at about 1:49 p.m. on the hills near the intersection of Haskell Canyon Road and Copper Hill Drive and was contained at 4:26 p.m., said county fire Inspector Don Kunitomi.

A second fire on the opposite side of the Santa Clarita Valley charred about eight acres of brush along the northbound lanes of Highway 14 north of Soledad Canyon Road. That fire sparked at about 3:30 p.m. and was contained within two hours, said Michael Pittman, a Fire Department dispatcher. California Highway Patrol officers closed two lanes of traffic on Highway 14 for about two hours during the fire, authorities said.

Nearly 200 firefighters and four helicopters were sent to fight the fire on Copper Hill Drive, Kunitomi said. While no property was damaged, one Fire Department camp crew member broke his finger and another suffered a laceration on his cheek, Kunitomi said.

Copper Hill Drive at Haskell Canyon Road was blocked off by sheriff’s cruisers and jammed with fire trucks and television news crews. Dozens of residents were gathered in the Walgreens pharmacy parking lot at the same intersection to watch helicopters douse the hillside with water.

Two people were arrested for obstructing a firefighter in the performance of his duties, Parker said. Anthony Fierro, 33, of Saugus, refused to leave an area where helicopters needed to make a water drop, and once escorted away, ran back to the drop spot, according to Parker.

A 16-year-old boy preventing a separate water drop ran from investigators and disappeared, prompting an hour-long rescue effort. He was found wearing a different set of clothes and arrested on an obstruction charge.

A wall of flames surrounded the homes on Brookview Terrace, said Mike Smith, whose home backs up to one of the hills that was charred. Smith, 43, said flames moved quickly over the hill and came within about 70 feet of his home before being pushed back by firefighters.

“When the fire came down the hill, it was on,” Smith recalled. “It got hot and smoky real quick. Some of the flames were 20 feet high, and I’m probably being conservative.”

Smith used his iPhone to shoot almost two hours of video showing firefighters battling the inferno as it barreled toward his home. Smith could be heard on the video cheering as helicopters dropped water on the flames.

Thick smoke completely obscured visibility at times.

“You couldn’t see anything; you couldn’t even see the sun,” Smith said while smoking a cigar after the flames subsided. “There’s been fires, but never this close. And the wind was blowing the fire toward the houses.”

Smith was showing the video to friends and neighbors across the street from his home after the flames were doused.

A group of about 10 fire crew members dressed in orange jumpsuits were using chainsaws to clear brush on the hill about 4:30 p.m. while other firefighters dressed in yellow were spraying white fire retardant foam on some of the blackened brush that had been scorched by flames.

Bob and Lisa Pritchard, who also live on Brookview Terrace, said they called the Fire Department after one of their neighbors smelled smoke. The same neighbor had walked up a sidewalk that curled around the hill and come running back down moments later saying he saw flames.

The Pritchards began spraying their home with garden hoses and dousing the hillside until the Fire Department got there.

They stopped when wind gusts started spinning the smoke on the hill into a vortex. Lisa Pritchard said she wasn’t sure how long the fire lasted, but said the whole afternoon went by fast.

“I’ve never seen a fire come over that hill so quickly,” she said. “But the Fire Department did get here quickly.”