Police despatch in the UK. Had someone call in because 2 squirrels were fighting in her back garden “no, we don’t arrest squirrels.” On a similar vein, had a recent immigrant call, had a strange & deadly creature in the back garden. On arrival, turns out to be a hedgehog. Also had woman hysterically call in about a snake in her toilet. Turned out to be big poo !

Had an elderly neighbor who called the police a few times a day. The local firefighters said they would have the calls transferred to them from the sheriffs office. Most ridiculous stuff like losing the remote, outside lights wouldn’t come on, cat scratching at her door etc. I tried to be polite but if I walked too close to her grass on the side walk she would threaten to call the law on me.

Caller believed his neighbors jack-o’-lanterns were carved suspiciously.

I work in the ER so I’m on the receiving end of some dumb 911 calls. Most recent was a guy who shows up via ambulance at 1am because he twisted his ankle 3 days ago and it still hurts. The medic who brought him in was not amused.

I’m the one who called… I got lost in a hotel in the middle of the night after hooking up with some dude and ended up in their inner courtyard with everything locked. The receptionist told me he couldn’t find me and to call the cops. They had to get me out of there. SO embarrassing. First thing I did when they picked up was apologize.

Cousin was a 911 operator. Someone called to say they had nail gunned their hand to the wall four times. She sent the ambulance and then stayed on the phone with them in case they feinted. Cousin: “So, FOUR nails?! You didn’t decided to stop after the first? On phone: “I was on a roll”.

July 1996 a dust storm blew in and at least 20 people called 9-1-1 to report aliens. Yes, the dust storm did look exactly like the one in the movie Independence Day that was just released. No, aliens were not invading.

Firefighter here. Here are a few actual calls we have been started to: Popcorn in the eye. Ghost in the attic. Possible smoke in the house(turns out the caller was crying which made things blurry so they thought it was smoke). Adult with leg stuck in laundry shoot.
Caller dropped a cigarette on the garage floor and didn’t know what to do. Fried chicken was too dry.
Leg through the floor while on the toilet.

Paramedic here. At the height of lockdown in the UK I was sent to a lady who called for an emergency ambulance as her ‘sex drive was too high.’ Also on my list of stupid calls: Guy in his late 30’s who burnt his tongue on a baked potato. Someone who has had pain in their knee for 30 years (decided at 3am that this was the time to get it sorted.) A man in his 40’s who had a nightmare. A guy who thought he might feel unwell later. Man who scratched his testicle in the night with his long fingernail. No blood.

Obligatory not an operator, but here in the UK a guy called the police repeatedly as a UFO was hovering over his house at about the same time every night. The operator asked him to go outside and describe what he was seeing. About halfway through the description, the penny drops and the caller admits that the “glowing UFO” is quite possibly the Moon.

I’m not a dispatcher but I can imagine the dispatcher thought this would take the cake.. I worked on the road for awhile and the guy I roomed with was a complete moron. He called 911 to ask if there were any fireworks in town that weekend since it was the 4th of July. He tried to explain to me, it is a public service directory so as long as you say “this is not an emergency” they’ll be able to answer other questions. Seriously, dumbest guy I ever met.

My personal favorite was the guy that called in because there was a racoon in a tree in his yard. It should be noted that I dispatch for a low density county and medium density small city. Me: Sir, what is it doing? Is it acting aggressive? Racoon guy: No, he’s just in my yard. Me : … so what is the issue, what do you want done? RG: I want someone to come get it. It shouldn’t be here! Me: Sir… raccoons…. live in trees. RG: But I live in the city!

My mom was the one that called: it was the middle of the night and just me ( I was 15F) and her home at the time, dad out of town, and someone kept ringing our doorbell for 20+ min. We were scared it was someone trying to get us to open the door so they could break in since it was 12 am. Mom calls 911, cops come. Turns out it was our neighbor trying to tell us that our garage door was open!! The police were just like “how about you guys exchange cell phone numbers for the future?” Pretty embarrassing

I had one call on Thanksgiving that their oven was locked and they could not get their turkey out… it was really busy that night and we instructed them to turn the oven off and we could head over when we could.

Stupidest? That is like a daily occurance so it’s hard to pinpoint. I was the dispatcher on a fire once that was started by a lady who tried to cremate her cat on the stove. She answered the door naked and acted as if nothing was wrong. Apartment neighbor called it in from smoke coming out underneath the door.

There were 2 raccoons on the side of the road. One looked to be in distress. The 2nd raccoon looked at the caller and put his paws around his neck, thus giving the universal sign for choking, so she called for help.

Had someone call in screaming that they were on fire. Sounded legit, I’ve heard a lot of different screams, including another of someone actually on fire, and this one sounded like one of those “im actually dying” screams. I tried everything I could to get them to calm down, stop drop and roll, literally anything but she just kept screaming. When the fire department eventually got there she calmed down and I was able to hear her tell them that her crotch was on fire after she had sex with her neighbor…..