I have a friend who is a police dispatcher and he tells me some really incredible stories about some of the calls they get.
Like, really ridiculous things that even veteran writers couldn’t think up.
In this AskReddit article, 911 operators share the dumbest calls they’ve ever received.
Yeeesh.
1. Services rendered
“Guy called in one night to say his prostitute wouldn’t give him back his change he was due for “services rendered.” He never got the hint that he shouldn’t have been with a prostitute in the first place, before he admitted that she had used some of his cocaine and he wanted reimbursed for that too.
He was so focused on getting whatever money he was owed back that he also didn’t care that he was a felon who had warrants for DV and Felonious Assault.
By the time the officers showed up, the prostitute had enough sense to get out of there before we showed up but he stayed fully expecting us to give him his money back somehow. Needless to say, he did not get his wish.”
2. Put down the brownie
“I was a 911 call taker 15 years ago, before the recreational use of marijuana was legal.
A man called in to request an ambulance. He said he’d been eating only “special” brownies for three days straight and could not stop vomiting that morning.
His voice was soft and a bit quivery; he did sound sick and maybe a little high, so I sent him one. While we were still on the line together, I could hear him chewing.
“Are you eating right now?” “They’re just so gooooood,” he said. He was still eating the brownies!”
3. The gutters have water in them!
“Someone called in to report a lot of water leaking from a house which she noticed whilst walking her dog and thought was flooded inside. Police weren’t busy so we sent them to have a look. It was raining and the woman had basically reported water coming from the gutters.
Also had a call from an old woman who had fallen and cut her leg. One of the questions I was required to ask was “Is your breathing normal?” She yelled back “Of course my bleeding isn’t normal you idiot. I don’t just bleed out of my leg on a daily basis!” “No, your BREATHING” “Oh yes that’s normal dear.”
4. Sheep in the road
“I called 911 around 1am one night to report a sheep. I honestly didn’t know what to do and I didn’t want anyone (including the sheep) to get hurt.
911 – What’s your emergency?
Me – I’d like to report a sheep walking in the middle of the street.
911 – Okay… where are you?
Me – I’m heading south on Little School Rd in Arlington, headed towards Kennedale (TX, very populated and city/suburb area). I just passed the gas station…
911 – So you called to report a sheet walking around?
Me – Yes. It is in the middle of the road heading north on the wrong side and I really think someone is going to hit it. I have no idea where it would have come from. I don’t know of any farms around here…
911 – So, a sheet is walking around and you’re afraid someone is going to hit it?
Me – Did you say ‘sheet’? I’m saying ‘sheep’, as in a grown up lamb, like a farm animal….
911 – ohhh! A SHEEP. Where did you say you are again? I’ll get a patrol out there ASAP.
I guess she thought I was some drunk kid talking about a sheet I saw on the side of the road or something. She was just appeasing me until I hung up…? Poor 911 lady. I’m still not sure if it was a legit emergency.”
5. I need that number
“911 what is your emergency?”
“Can I get the number to Domino’s?”
“Sir, this is 911 for emergencies only. You’re thinking of 411.”
“Oh. Can I still get the number?”
6. Oh my…
“A guy called freaked out about his penis shrinking after sex.”
7. It’s too big!
“My mother got a call on Christmas Day saying their emergency was the turkey was too big to fit in the oven. They’d had quite a bit to drink at that point and were all screaming about the turkey.”
8. “My dealer ripped me off!”
“Lady called and wanted to report her dealer for theft. She gave him $20 but he didn’t give her the dime bags. I s**t you not she sat on the curb and waited for a police officer. Props to the vice cops who then used her help to nail her dealer. They didn’t just tell her she was being dumb.
Honorable mention: guy called in saying he thought he was having a heart attack. I got to the question about chest pains and he confesses to mixing meth up in some water, putting it in a balloon, then shooting it up his butt. It hit him way harder than he thought it would and he thought he was going to die.”
9. Weirdo
“Caller had a noise complaint that his neighbor’s blow up Christmas decoration (the fan that inflates it) was “too loud.” It’s the standard decoration a makes a faint blowing sound. He said he recorded the sound on his phone which told him it was 50dB.
No… It was off when we got there. Refused advise to speak with neighbor about having it turn off earlier. (It was around 1030 PM).”
10. What in the…
“From my cousin: A clearly drunk man called to say that there was a stray dog that bit him and that he was bleeding. The man threatens to pee on the dog, but my cousin asks him not to. As they were talking he walked over to the dog.
My cousin hears him say “hey! F**k You” and then some fabric sounds, growling, and then some screams. No clue what happened to the man as he has dropped his phone and wasn’t there when the ambulance arrives.”
11. Not a real plane
“Not a 911 operator, but this happened several years ago and I was there.
My hobby is building and flying radio-controlled (RC) model airplanes. Our RC model airplane club operates a flying field with a runway that is maybe 0.5 miles from a 4-lane highway.
One fine summer day several of us were at the flying field and we were having a grand time making the model airplanes perform loops and rolls and spins in the air. Some of the model airplanes were equipped with smoke generators which made an impressive sight if you turned on the smoke while doing a loop or a spin.
Then a police car came. The officer told us that a driver on the highway had reported an aircraft going down trailing smoke. Next came a fire trunk. Then came a reporter from the local newspaper. (not TV news though, only print). She interviewed several people. And then a helicopter aerial ambulance flew in and landed on our runway.
It took the better part of an hour before everyone was convinced that the driver on the highway had seen an RC model airplane performing some stunts with the smoke on instead of a real airplane in distress.”
12. Serious stuff
“Non emergency dispatcher here:
Got a call about someone having a dispute with a a Wendy’s employee at a drive-thru. She was determined she was wronged somehow by the place and ended the argument by throwing her ice cream she had just purchased at the employee. I had to firmly tell her there was no crime here other than the assault she herself committed. She seem baffled. I was equally baffled she had the audacity to call and complain to the police.”
13. Next!
“I worked about 5 years as a dispatcher before becoming a cop, then worked part time in 911/radio. About ten years ago half the city was on fire, people were dying, losing their homes, there was a massive evacuation. You could see the smoke over the entire city. Guy calls 911, pissed off the DMV is closed. I yelled at him, to the point of any other time I would have been in some trouble, and hung up on him.
There was plenty of people working, and that was my final call. It’s so much easier to be a cop where I can arrest someone like that than be abused like a 911 call taker. My favorite prank caller was a lady who had some mental heath issues and would call from payphone and just say “I love you”- over and over. I would just tell her I loved her too, hang up, and move on to the next crisis.”
14. Oh boy
“Had a lady call requesting medic because she forgot she had left a tampon inside her for a month.”
15. Searching for ourselves
“I was out doing some training on a Coast Guard boat at night, about two miles from the beach. We were doing man overboard drills, with a strobe light attached to the dummy so we could see it. Our station receives a call from someone on the beach that they have visual of a distress light. Station contacts us and asks if we see anything, as the distress light was reported to be extremely close to where we are currently located. Nope, we deduct that the person on the beach is reporting our training light.
We had to sit out there for two more hours searching for ourselves.”
Wow.
I mean… WOW.
I’m actually kind of jealous I’m not a 911 operator.
Just kidding!
What did you you think about these stories? Let us know in the comments!
