Cornwall Fire & Rescue Service Newsdesk

Hayle at 15/06/2008 01:15

Firefighters from Camborne attended along with the police a call to a fire at the Library in Hayle. Firefighters were in attendance within five minutes and were unable to find any fire. The police are now dealing with this crime.

Whilst the emergency personnel were responding to this incident they were not available to answer a genuine call for help. Had a real emergency have occured in this area, resources would have had to travel from a greater distance, which would have resulted in an unecessary delay in help arriving. This extra time may be the difference between life and death.

Making hoax calls to the emergency services is a crime. Emergency services can request from the telephone company, in this case a mobile telephone, that a telephone number is rendered useless, so that further hoax calls cannot be made. This, of course, would cause inconvenience to the user.