Two calls per second ‘jammed emergency lines’ during violence in Hong Kong’s Yuen Long
- Police insiders say there was no way operators could deal with deluge of calls during attack on subway station, saying some people crowded the line deliberately
- Officers also hit out at claims of collusion with perpetrators
An emergency services hotline in northern Hong Kong was jammed by 24,000 calls in three hours on Sunday night, a senior police officer revealed on Tuesday after the force came under fire for its slow response to the violent attacks at a subway station.
The Post has learned that there were only 10 operators to handle the calls made between 10.30pm and 1.30am – which came in at an average rate of two per second, meaning they would each have had to deal with a call every five seconds to take them all. The centre usually handles an average of 2,500 calls a day.
Superintendent Lau Siu-pong said in a video posted on the force’s Facebook page on Tuesday that many calls were not answered as a lot of people tried report the attacks inside Yuen Long MTR station from about 10.45pm, especially after online appeals for people to call the line, some – police said – intending to jam it.
“This is totally impossible. And that explains the jamming of the line,” a police insider said. “People online also advocated that people call 999 to jam the line. So it was not us who did not want to pick up calls. As a matter of fact, we couldn’t.”
Police were also criticised for taking 35 minutes to send officers to the station, where about 100 armed, white-clad men attacked extradition bill protesters and other passengers. The attackers had fled by the time officers arrived at 11.20pm, leaving 45 people injured.