Blow-Up Doll Floating Down River Mistaken for Dead Woman

Passersby in a small English town were ready to phone police after they saw what appeared to be the dead body of a woman floating down a river.

It happened in the River Medway in Maidstone, Kent. A local man, 21-year-old Tom Maybury, told the Mirror: “Some people out for a ramble saw her first and were about to dial 999 for the Murder Squad. She was floating face-up between a moored boat and the river bank and looked for all the world like a body.”

Maybury suspects the doll was the work of pranksters after a cheap laugh.

This is not the first time a false alarm of this nature has rattled both police and residents. In Southampton, England, in 2011 a large police operation including a helicopter and armed officers was sparked after reported sightings of a live white tiger in a field. It turned out to be a stuffed animal.

In another case, a resident in Corwall, England, phoned police when they thought they saw a crocodile in their backyard. Police discovered it was toy crocodile.

Canadian police were called to a house in Toronto last year responding to reports of a man with a gun. They found instead a cardboard cut out of Arnold Schwarzenegger from the “Terminator” films holding a gun.

Toronto police tweeted: “UPDATE – PERSON W A GUN Grange Ave and Augusta Ave police on scene have located a Terminator cutout holding a gun. #IllBeBack #1366882 ^cb”.

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