Within the past two weeks, the city of Danville has seen five fires — all in vacant homes and only a few miles apart.
Many in the area believe that these fires are not coincidences.
"I know they not catching on by themselves, cause most of them, again, are abandoned and have been abandoned for years," said Danville resident Micah Smith.
In the early mornings of August 1 and 2, the Danville Fire Department saw two fires back to back.
On August 1, just after midnight, at 505 W. Madison, a fire broke out on an exterior wall and moved into the attic. Due to the unstable structure of the house, firefighters were unable to extinguish the fire in the attic. An excavator was called and the fire was then extinguished.
The following morning at 1:19, the Danville Fire Department fought another fire. The fire was at 118 N. California St. Flames and smoke could be seen coming out of the windows but it was able to be put out quickly.
Though the string of fires did not end there. From Saturday through Monday morning, Danville saw three more house fires.
The first fire was at 1:13 Saturday morning at 1022 Franklin Street. The fire was large enough to cause damage to the house next door as well, again both of these structures were also vacant.
Later that same day, a house at 322 Harmon St. was engulfed in flames. Fox Illinois was told by several Danville residents that this fire was the worst of them all.
The most recent fire took place Monday around 2 a.m., again on West Madison.
"We were watching T.V. in the house and we smelled some smoke, and we just came out here, proceeded outside, to see where the smoke was coming from and it was coming from this house on the corner, and we just seen nobody was around so we called the fire people," Smith said.
We reached out to the Danville Fire Department, but they were unavailable for an interview on Monday. They did say that all fires from this past weekend are still under investigation.