One 999 call every minute during Halloween

Leicestershire Police say they had record levels of calls on 31st October.

Leicestershire Police received record levels of demand on Tuesday 31st October due to Halloween and a series of incidents. 

During one four-hour period, the force received an average of one 999 call every minute.

1025 incidents were reported to police  – the highest number of incidents recorded in Leicestershire in a single 24-hour period for four years.

And among those incidents were several which required significant resources, including a lorry fire on the M1 which required the full closure of the motorway  and a number of serious incidents in towns and in the city of Leicester.

Demand on police services was exceptionally high throughout the day:

• A total of 527 Emergency 999 calls were received
• Between 5pm and 9pm we received an average of one 999 call every minute
• Numerous police officers had to remain on duty after their scheduled shifts had finished in order to cope with demand

Chief Constable Simon Cole said: “The sheer volume of calls, and the many incidents which required the deployment of lots of resources, caused a real strain on the force yesterday. As result, we simply could not attend every incident as swiftly as would have liked, and there remain incidents and issues reported to us yesterday that had to be put on hold until today.

“Without doubt a large part of this surge in demand and 999 calls was Hallowe’en-related; but the incident on the M1, coupled with many other resource-intensive and serious issues elsewhere added to the pressure and expectation on the force.

“The force responded superbly in extremely challenging circumstances, and our officers, support staff, Specials, volunteers and PCSOs did an amazing job coping with what was the busiest day for four years.

“The force remains very busy this morning, with many officers and specialist staff involved in a number of incidents that happened yesterday. In these circumstances, and to help us, I would be grateful if people would only ring 999 in a genuine emergency, and instead use 101 or on line reporting https://leics.police.uk/report-online about issues which are non-emergencies.”