AN investigation has been launched to find a hoax caller who sent two fire engines on a wild goose chase in Burnley.

Two fire crews were sent to Willow Street just after 8pm on Saturday when a man calling on a mobile phone claimed there was a serious fire.

But when the firefighters arrived they found no trace of a blaze because the call was a malicious hoax.

Fire bosses are so annoyed by the ‘risks’ the caller made they passed his details to the police.

Burnley watch manager Steve Harrison said: “Making hoax calls like this is moronic.

"Not only was this caller risking the lives of other people potentially caught in dangerous situations, but he was also wasting the time of my firefighters who are trying to protect the people of Burnley.

“This call was made by an adult male so it cannot even be put down to juvenile nuisance.

“Our control rooms have the capacity to ban calls from certain numbers and we are now looking into doing this with this caller.

“He has therefore taken his own life into his own hands.”

Last year, 1,389 hoax calls were made to the Lancashire Fire Service.

Fire chiefs said this type of call could have a devastating impact.

A fire service spokesman said: “A hoaxer most probably took a life in 1996, when he sent fire crews racing to Victoria Hospital, Blackpool, on a false fire call, just as fire erupted in the house of five-year-old Jason Walsh.

“Though the back-up fire crews were there in under four minutes, precious seconds were needlessly lost by the hoax call which might possibly have made the difference.

"Jason died in hospital later that day.”