Bird mimicking police siren leaves inspector fooled at Bicester station

A police inspector has told the BBC how he was the first to be tricked by a bird mimicking the sound of a siren.

Simon Hills said the two-tone impression had officers believing a car was faulty at Thames Valley Police's Bicester station in Oxfordshire.

But following investigations, the culprit was found to be a bird.

The local wildlife trust said the male blackbird was making the noise to both attract a mate as well as warn other males away from its territory.

Insp Hills, from the roads policing unit, said: "I sat at my desk after a weekend off and in the distance I could hear the faint sound of what sounded like a police siren and, because we repair a lot of police cars here, I thought it was maybe one that was defective and the battery was starting to go flat."

Listen here: [bbc.co.uk]