A 999 call every 9 seconds for Abu Dhabi Police

The operations room at Abu Dhabi Police received a total of 3,429,844 calls in 2012.

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ABU DHABI // Police in the capital received an average of 6.5 calls a minute last year for a total of 3,429,844 calls.

That means 999 calls were placed at a rate of one every nine seconds.

Lt Col Nasser Al Maskari, director of the operations department, said 2,077,342 people called 999 from Abu Dhabi, 1,109,389 from Al Ain and 243,113 from the Western Region.

Of those millions, only 786,995 resulted in police reports: 481,793 traffic reports and 305,202 criminal reports.

Lt Col Al Maskari said 469,894 police cases were registered in Abu Dhabi, 291,245 in Al Ain and 25,856 in the Western Region.

The operations room also received its fair share of prank calls. Police did not reveal how many were bogus, but said most were made by children.

* An earlier version of this article said 277,342 people called 999 from Abu Dhabi when the actual figure is 2,077,342.