The Jamaica Fire Brigade (JFB) is facing a troubling spike in prank calls, with a 24.4% rise in malicious false alarms in 2024. Commissioner Stewart Beckford revealed that the JFB responded to 1,759 false alarm calls last year, up from 1,413 in 2023—a trend that is stretching emergency resources thin and putting communities at risk.
A major factor behind this surge is the wave of bomb threats targeting schools, government offices, and business process outsourcing (BPO) companies. These threats, while mostly hoaxes, require immediate response from emergency personnel, pulling them away from real crises.
Beyond bomb threats, prank calls see a sharp uptick during the summer months, when children—some as young as four or five—have unrestricted access to mobile phones. Commissioner Beckford noted that young children, often out of school and unsupervised, are a significant source of these false alarms.
“With the easy availability of mobile phones, young children are sometimes behind these calls. While we encourage parents to equip their kids with a way to reach them or call for help in real emergencies, it’s equally important to teach them the dangers of misusing emergency services,” Beckford explained.
The consequences of prank calls extend beyond wasted time. Fire trucks responding to false alarms have been involved in accidents, and in some cases, these hoaxes have left entire districts temporarily unprotected when real emergencies arise.
While Jamaica does not yet have the technology to track and penalize prank callers, Commissioner Beckford confirmed that a new emergency system is in the works. This system will not only identify the location of callers but also ensure emergency teams can quickly respond if a genuine call is cut off.
“This upgrade will allow us to track the source of calls, making it easier to deter hoaxers while also improving response times for real emergencies,” he said.
As the JFB continues to push for stricter measures against prank calls, the public is urged to take emergency services seriously. False alarms don’t just waste resources—they endanger lives.
