The Bully Fire was a wildfire in Shasta County.
It started on July 11, 2014 at 3:37 PM PDT. The fire quickly spread to , and it was only 5% contained. During the next day, dry weather coupled with a heat wave allowed to fire to advance to , prompting mandatory evacuations to be issued for the region, as well as several miles of road closures. During the next few days, the wildfire exploded to , prompting additional evacuations, since the wildfire was only 25% contained. A couple of days later, the Bully Fire reached , but the containment also increased to 45%. By July 18, the wildfire had expanded further to , with the containment only at 65%. During the next few days, containment gradually increased to 95%, before progress stalled on July 22.
However, the increase in containment allowed the road closures and the evacuation orders to be lifted. During the next 4 days, firefighting efforts continued slowly to extinguish the Bully Fire, until full containment of the perimeter was achieved on July 26, at 8:00 PM PDT. Fire patrols lingered for the next couple of days to work on extinguishing the blaze, and on July 28, the Bully Fire was reported to be 100% controlled.
During its duration, the Bully Fire destroyed a total of 20 residential structures. A total of 21 injuries and 1 death were also reportedly caused by the fire, which was determined to be human-caused.
In 2016, Freddie Alexander Smoke III was arrested by police in Indiana and extradited to Shasta County. He pleaded no contest to charges of
arson
Arson is the crime of willfully and deliberately setting fire to or charring property. Although the act of arson typically involves buildings, the term can also refer to the intentional burning of other things, such as motor vehicles, wat ...