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(Date Posted:17/01/2008 18:56:58)
LONDON (AFP) - An elderly woman in Scotland watching a film on television triggered an alert by calling coastguards to alert them to swimmers in distress after confusing drama with real life, an official said Wednesday.
A Royal Navy helicopter, a lifeboat and a team of coastguards were sent to hunt for the "missing" bathers on Monday after a call from the unidentified woman in Ayr, south-west England.
But officials realised soon afterwards that the woman, who had been watching the 2003 film "Open Water" showing a couple being attacked by sharks while scuba diving, had imagined that the scenes on television were real.
"She was watching a programme on TV and she phoned 999 (the emergency number in Britain) and asked for the coastguard," a local coastguard spokesman said.
"We could hear the screams in the background. She just thought it was a real incident happening in front of her."
He added: "You can't charge her with hoax calls, you just feel sorry for her."
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