(1/7/00)
COPENHAGEN (Reuters) - A Danish man set off a real-life sea rescue mission while playing with toy ships in his bathtub, a newspaper reported Friday.
The drunk 52-year-old called in repeated mayday alarms to the Maritime Sea Rescue Command as he piloted his water toys, claiming he was captain of a 12-crew freighter in distress.
Giving a position west of the Baltic Sea island of Bornholm, which belongs to Denmark, he said his vessel was listing 45 degrees and that one crew member had been washed overboard, after being ``attacked by a rubber duck of incredible size.''
The authorities leaped to respond, sending two rescue vessels to search the area for one-and-a-half hours.
Police eventually traced the phone calls to the home of the intoxicated man, who admitted the false alarm.
He faced fines and compensation claims of 10,000 crowns ($1,400) for the ``disaster,'' which police told the daily Sjaellands Tidende was the first of its kind on record.
Authorities were embarrassed by not realizing the emergency call was a hoax after the rubber duck report. ``Operators were convinced that such an event was well within the realm of possibility, and we did not want to take any chances,'' said a police official who requested that his name be withheld.