Investigators allege that the suspects were smoking along a hiking trail and failed to properly extinguish their cigarettes, leading to the blaze.

The wildfire, officials said, was started after the four were smoking on a hiking trail at the state park and did not put out their cigarettes. Sheriff Tommy Blankenship said the group of teenage hikers’ alleged action has cut short efforts to locate Womacks.

South Carolina Forestry Commission agents made the arrests Tuesday in the Table Rock and Persimmon Ridge wildfires, the state's largest-ever