At around 1:30 a.m., a LimeBike was on fire near Cornell’s North Campus. The fire appeared to be minor, Cornell police said, but not an accident.
Four more of the neon-green bikes were on fire within the next two hours, the Ithaca Police Department said in a press release on Wednesday morning.
Two of the bikes were found near N. Cayuga Street, another on N. Geneva Street and the last on N. Albany Street.
The fires on the neon-green bikes “appear to have been set intentionally,” CUPD wrote in a CrimeAlert of arson sent to campus at around 5 a.m. on Wednesday.
The first reported fire, at the North Stewart Avenue Bridge, was described as minor, and all the fires were reportedly “extinguished without incident,” the IPD release said.
LimeBikes — a bikeshare option launched in Ithaca in April 2018 — are dockless, so finished riders can leave the bikes almost anywhere, although LimeBike advises riders to park the bikes out of the way of pedestrians.
CUPD said that there is no suspect description, but urged all with information about the suspected arson to contact either CUPD or IPD. IPD also asked anyone who may have witnessed the scene or with residential cameras to contact their office.