Police in Chile have arrested a former firefighter on suspicion of contributing to a deadly forest fire which killed 137 people in February.

The suspect worked for Chile’s National Service for Disaster Prevention and served as a volunteer firefighter at the time that several fires spread through the Valparaíso region.

Officials have accused the 39-year-old man of being responsible for at least one of the four blazes which broke out almost simultaneously around the city of Viña del Mar on 2 February.

Police said the suspect had set the blaze because “he likes to be a hero, participating and helping in emergencies”.

Local media reported that the man had been hailed as a “hero” after he had successfully contained a previous blaze in his local area.

He had been disciplined by the fire service for rushing to that fire without waiting for official orders, but his local community praised him for what they said was his fast action.

He is the third person to be arrested in connection with the devastating blaze which broke out in February.

The two others, another firefighter and a park ranger, have been in custody since May.

Prosecutors suspect the three men of having hatched the plan together.

The firefighter detained in May said he and the park ranger had agreed that it would be financially beneficial to them if they could do overtime fighting fires.

The 22-year-old described lighting cigarettes with matches and throwing them from his car.

The blaze started in the Lago Peñuelas national park.

The flames were fanned by high winds and the vegetation, dried out by extreme temperatures at the time, quickly caught fire.

They spread to the hills surrounding Viña del Mar and the towns of Quilpué and Villa Alemana, destroying thousands of homes.

The coastal area is popular with holidaymakers and was packed with people trying to escape the heatwave.

In total 137 people died because of the fires, while 16,000 suffered financial losses and more than 2,000 homes were destroyed.

Officials had said from the start that they suspected the fire had been deliberately set.