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Police Officers Reveal Everything About All Hands On Deck Crime Scenes

Police Officers Reveal Everything About All Hands On Deck Crime Scenes

Police Officers Reveal Everything About All Hands On Deck Crime Scenes

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The brothers in blue have a tough job and there are incidents that sometimes require a swarm of cops. From violent crimes to air disasters, these stories are ingrained in officers' memories.

S-IVB_Upper_Stage asked, Police officers of Reddit, have you ever had an "all units" call, and if so, what happened?

Submissions have been edited for clarity, context, and profanity.

Darn them pesky rodents...

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Twenty-five years ago, smallish rural town, my dad is a beat cop on patrol. My cat brings in a live mouse and is playing with it in the kitchen and my mom is deathly afraid of rodents. So she calls dispatch and tells them my dad needs to come home. Dispatch gets on the line and tells my dad to switch to a secured line, there's an emergency at home. My dad's driving home to take care of the issue when all of the cops (probably like 4) of my small town on patrol come with sirens and lights blazing on my house because all they heard was there was an emergency at my dad's house. My mother was mortified.

When you're not keen on highway abbreviations...

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Years ago, Friend of mine was a dispatcher for the County- he covered sheriff, EMS and fire communications, and also worked with communicating with other agencies as well.

From the state troopers, he got some sort of text communication( not a phone text this was before that was a thing) and it referred to an accident with injuries at the intersection of I-40 and Business 85.

Something along the lines of "COLLISION I-40 BUS 85 INJURIES INVOLVED"

The way it was abbreviated and written made him misread it - instead of an accident at 85 Business, he thought there was a Buss Collision on I-40, with 85 people injured.

He dispatched every damn fire truck and ambulance the county had, they show up and it's a 2 car wreck with minor injuries.

Edit: wasn't actually I-40, but I can't remember which highway it was - somewhere in Davidson. I know the Bus 85 part is right though.

I hope I get to use the line "send everything with lights" someday...

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When my buddy was still new, he worked in a larger city. They had just gotten the "shoulder mics". You know, the ones every cop has now mounted up by their mouth so they can call in easier? When new to them, they wore the cord in FRONT of their shirts, always "in the damn way". And great handles when people wanted to wrestle. Jimmy was called one night to a bar brawl. He strolled into the bedlam almost over. He was a rookie, always getting the sh_t detail, so he was becoming famous among his department for ruining his uniforms. To the point he was having to come out of pocket to replace them. He walked into a vet telling him to "cuff everyone still here", they'll sort them out later.

Jimmy grabs the closest guy, they struggle a little and go down to the ground. As they do, rrrriiiippp, Jimmy splits his pants "clean up the backside". Knowing he's going to be the butt of jokes anyway, he turns his head to announce to the other officers, "Well, that's another uniform down!" And keys his mic. Base hears "uniform down". So does everyone else in the county.

The radio EXPLODES with chatter, but the three cops at the bar already have their hands full....so they turn down their radios. (FU #2)

Base decided to "roll everything with lights" to the scene. Jimmy said they were glad of the help when the first few cars rolled up...but they just....kept...coming....

He was known as "Jack the Radio Ripper" till he transferred.

Minor reprimand and he still had to pay for the pants.

An hour-long fight? I want tickets.

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Former cop here. The all units call was basically a riot at a large nightclub in a very rough area of the neighboring city. Once things were finally calmed down and the dozen or so people were taken away and my boss wanted us all back in our city I was amazed at not only how many cops showed up but from where....counties and towns I had never heard of before. I looked up a few at the end of shift and some came from an hour plus away.

Doesn't new equipment come with instructions?

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So, I interned at the local PD at a time when all stations received new radio devices. The new devices looked a bit like old cell phones and had a bright orange "panic button" on top. It was meant for situations where e.g. a single police officer was attacked and needed help. Pushing that button resulted in all communication on the standard "channel 1" being turned to one-way communication only (so all units would listen to what's going on wherever the panic button was pressed) and an automatic "all (free) units call". All other units had to switch to (the much weaker) "Channel 2" to communicate -- but Channel 2 only allowed 1 device to speak. (So either dispatch OR car 1 OR car 2 etc. could talk, but not multiple people at the same time like on channel 1.)

To disable the panic mode, you had to push the bright orange button in a certain way (think of holding it for 3 seconds followed by 4 quick pushes). It could not be done remotely.

This happened in a rather large city where some police stations are closed at night (usually the ones in the suburbs where few calls come in). That night, an older PO closed down the remotest station in the suburbs and decided to shut off the radio devices. You guessed it, he pushed the panic button on top because he thought that's where the devices were to be turned on and off, without realizing what he did. He locked the station and went home. Since it was the first day of using the new radio devices, quite a few officers were unsure how to turn to channel 2. Basically, all communication was blocked. Cue panic everywhere with frantic cell phone calls to dispatch, and dispatch trying to figure out who closed that station (and thus had one of the only keys to open it), so the panic mode could be disabled. This unintentional "all units call" turned into an actual "no units (can) call", though quite a few units were busy trying to resolve the situation.

This is at least 3 stars in GTA, easily.

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Police Dispatcher here,

Usually, these happen whenever an Officer screams for help or when there are calls for a shooting in progress or something else high priority that requires a perimeter set-up.

It's tempting to push those buttons.

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Our local school has a spring festival that's a big fundraiser for us. The local police have been extremely supportive, and always send out a VW bug painted in police colors. The officer they send is great with kids and an excellent ambassador for the force. So, bright sunny spring day, kids milling around, carnival atmosphere. I'm walking with my friends, one eye on my kids. My friends have their non-verbal autistic son close by since it's a lot of stimuli. He loves the police car. Sirens, lights... it's awesome. Officer McFriendly crouches down to eye level as the boy is sitting in the car. The boy turns to him and offers a 'high-five'... landing his hand on the officer's radio. More precisely, on the 'officer down' panic button. Like the doleful eye of Sauron, every cop in range turns to converge on the schoolyard. The officer realizes what's happening and manages to wave off the imminent hot takedown of a pre-schooler... but I must say there was genuine fear in his eyes.

A bomb threat was called in to distract from a bank robbery.

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Former Royal Canadian Mounted Police here in a small tourist town. Was working on a regular, mid-week day shift when we received a dispatched call for a bomb threat, in the industrial/commercial sector of the town. We all went there, called in the bomb squad, the dogs, got people out of the area, and so on. We were doing roadside when we got another call that the local bank's silent alarm was turned on.

Now, we are in Canada, in a tourist town, things are usually relatively calm. But this. This was absolutely chaotic. We got the All unit call, they call our neighboring detachment to help, we all split and head to the bank. We arrive (around 20 some patrol cars all around) there to see all bank employees bounded and gagged, smoke everywhere from smoke bombs.

We realize very quickly that the bomb threat was the diversion, we immediately got a BOLO out to get the 3 males, identified by the Bank staff, including a former bank employee. We get the BOLO out to CPIC, got words to airports and border crossings. We managed to catch 2/3 of the guys, the last one flew back to his home country (was in Canada on a student visa). We remained on high alert for days after this, looking for the third guy.

Canadian authorities worked with their colleagues from the other guy's country to get him extradited almost a year later. In the end, as I recall, about $130,000 were missing and never recovered.

For most of us, it was the first time we had a bomb threat and/or a robbery. First time we were guarding an area, expecting to be shot at from an unknown location. (The robbers were reported to have AK47-type looking weapons).

Edit 1: BOLO - Be On the LookOut for / CPIC - Canadian Police Information Centre Edit 2: Changed deported by extradited. N.B. I won't name the town or the country involved.

Imagine having to tell a colleague they aren't dying...

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Prior to changing careers, I was a deputy sheriff working for a relatively large county in the Midwest. Each deputy had their own "zone" within the county they had to cover. One Saturday morning after working the night shift, I overheard over the radio that a unit was performing a routine stop. He was calling in the info when over the radio frequency, static and loud blasts were heard, followed by "Officer hit! Officer hit! Shots Fired, Officer Down!" I'll never forget that day. Like I had tunnel vision, I high-tailed it about 30 miles over and I was about 3 minutes away (initially 20) before being able to report back to dispatch to inform them I was en-route. In total 3 jurisdictions, 40 total units responded. Arrived on scene, 4th or 5th unit there in a standoff with a person in a vehicle who we later determined to have committed suicide. The officer was shot several times but survived. He was about 4 months away from retiring. I remember performing basic life support on him, cutting open his shirt and applying pressure. He looked at me, tearing up, "hey, tell my wife and kids they're always number one in my heart and thank you for the best years of my life." I said, "you're not dying." I changed careers shortly after and now I'm a medical student. My revelation.

Edit: Wow, thank you so much for the encouragement and the response! I appreciate the gold! :) I rarely tell this story since it always makes me emotional, but I will utter the same sentiment many officers would say, I was just doing my job! As corny as it sounds, I have a tattoo commemorating this event in my life. It's the Sigil of the Archangel Raphael (the archangel of healing)

Where are you that you need all hands on deck once a month?!

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Usually about once a month or so. We're taught that if you need backup if sh_t's hitting the fan, call it in and worry about how many people come later.

A unit was on patrol 2 weeks ago and some guy just started shooting at him. All the unit got out was "34th st, 10-33 I'm taking fire" (10-33 is the code for sending the cavalry/Officer in need of assistance). It all ended fine, we caught the guy, no injuries, but you better believe every officer in our area dropped what they were doing and went.

Another recent one a mini-riot broke out at a candle vigil for a murder victim. An officer stepped in alone (bad move) to stop the fight, and started getting his ass handed to him. All he said was "Patomic, 10-33" but it worked. We came in, dispersed the crowd, and got out.

Edit: good chance to rant about a pet peeve of mine. When 1033 goes out, there are always a few units who block the air with useless chatter. "hold me responding" "what's their location" "dispatcher I'll come back to my current assignment later" "do they need a rifle on the scene ". It drives me CRAZY. Get off the radio and leave the air clear for the unit fighting for their lives. And every unit not on something absolutely necessary is required to respond, why would you waste time to say you're going.

Not jumping in front of a moving vehicle is a good policy.

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I got run over by someone fleeing the scene of an incident that they weren't involved in. He just got scared and apparently had a gun on him. I was out of my car talking to the person who called and my partner was trying to stop the person who was really called on, so he didn't even see me get hit. No one knew I got hit or where I was because my radio went flying. Luckily there was a lot of witnesses who called 911 and found my radio. I confused the dispatcher because I was in so much shock that I came over radio taking like I normally do, but I was bleeding badly from my head and broke my leg. I didn't feel the pain for about two hours.

So I had that call come out because of me. I'm also pretty sure a policy got made because of me too.

"I'll never do that again."

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I remember listening to an episode of This American Life where an officer accidentally locked himself in the back of his car when he went to take a nap. He left his radio in the front, so he called dispatch and was like, "Don't make this a big thing, just send one unit to me." And then dispatch proceeded to call out the code for "Officer Down." So then he heard a bunch of cars put on their sirens and race to him.

"Crimes of passion" are still crimes, yo.

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Not a police officer, but I shadowed one a few years back. They had an "all units" call that day at around noon to some house out in the woods that was partly in their bounds but some of the driveway was not (as part of another county's bounds). The entire police force which totaled out to be around 12 police cars, 2 officers each (minus our car which was the officer + me but I'm not an officer) arrived at this place and this house looked like a bit of a trainwreck. Somebody nearby had reported hearing gunshots and screaming (there were a few houses near this one, but not really too far apart).

I couldn't go in, but everybody else did. According to the officer I was shadowing, they found a guy sitting and staring at a blank TV screen quietly humming to himself with a shotgun in his lap. Several officers stayed with the guy (who was totally out of it) and others, including the one I shadowed, went upstairs. They found a dead woman and man laying in bed together, and in another room a young child which had been strangled to death.

Apparently, the man downstairs came home to his wife in bed with another man, and he grabbed his gun and just straight up shot them, but that guy wasn't the one who killed the kid. The wife did, according to a journal that admitted to her adultery for many years and the "intolerable screaming" coming from the child.

Don't know what the guy got charged with/how long he went to prison for, but man the whole thing was just so f_cked up.

Every. Damn. Weekend. In. College.

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I work as a police communicator at a local university, usually, an 'all units' call is a fire alarm at one of the buildings. However, most of the time it's a false alarm and someone just burnt the popcorn in the lounge.

My cop uncle once smashed his thumb to get out of work.

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We had an all units call to one of our own stabbed. Everyone went hell for leather to get there, to find one of our guys on the floor with a stab wound to the stomach. We searched everywhere for the suspects and anyone matching descriptions was arrested. So turns out the officer did it to himself. He'd heard you couldn't be fired from work if you were injured in the line of duty (he was under investigation for a minor issue, not anything involving the public. Just breach of procedure) I don't think I've ever been so disgusted with a colleague in my life. All the other "all units" calls I've been to have been genuine and luckily my colleagues unhurt.

I almost called one myself when someone pulled out a sawn-off shotgun at me. Luckily that panned out OK!???????

Hearing shots over the radio would freak me out...

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We have calls almost daily that kind of meet this requirement. We have patrol sectors, each with a 2 man cruiser and a 1 man cruiser. The 2 man cars handle the high priority calls and the 1 man cars handle the more mundane stuff. So when a call comes in like shots fired both sector cars go and usually other sector cars start radioing in that they are also responding. I do remember 1 night at midnight, which is shift change, we had a 2 man unit that shot a guy who pulled out a gun on them. You could hear gunshots over the radio and the car calling for help. The dispatcher kinda stumbled a bit, then said: "everybody go, everybody go."

Ride along goals?

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I was doing a ride along in college in a fairly small city in GA when we got an "all available units" call. The address came in, the lights and siren went on and we were hauling at about 120 (mph) across town.

I had no idea where we were headed until we got there. The only thing the officer said to me was, "no matter what happens, stay in the car. If you see anyone with a gun call it out on the radio like this (showed me). If any of us get shot, call it in and stay in the car."

Then, he took a deep breath, calmly got out of the car, and took off at a sprint towards a forty person melee in front of the only strip club in town.

We were the first car there. Over the course of the next 30 seconds, officers arrived and kept coming until they outnumbered the people fighting. The officer I was riding with was completely on his own for a 10 second eternity and was able to rip about 10 people apart from fighting before backup arrived. It was the single bravest and most humbling thing I've ever seen with my own eyes.

When it was all over, he got back in the car with 3 drunk and beaten up dudes in the back, turned to me and said, "So when you gonna sign up?"

I've got a couple more stories from that summer doing ride alongs if anyone wants to hear.

Military PTSD is sadly real.

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You might like this tale from a military base that will remain unnamed! While doing a shift change inventory of the armory, one of our security forces guys noted that a weapon was missing and signed out to none other than the security forces commander himself. They send a unit to his home in base housing to retrieve the weapon and address the situation. When they enter the commanders home they find that he's threatening his family and himself with the sidearm. The junior of the pair read the situation as the commander is trying to get attention to address his poor mental state and has no lethal intent. He decides to fire a round into the commander's leg and then disarms him. This kid ends up getting step promoted to E5 but also received a Letter of Admonishment for firing his weapon without lethal intent.

This doesn't seem like something you recover from.

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Happened to my dad when he was stationed overseas, there was an airshow disaster in Germany and he was already there so he was one of the first to respond. He struggles with it still. fireworks and barbeques remind him of the smell of burning flesh that day.

People Describe The Most Historically Significant Event They've Ever Witnessed In Person

Reddit user FictionVent asked: 'What is the most historically significant event you witnessed IN PERSON?'

Aircraft losing control
Richard R. Schünemann/Unsplash

Do you ever wonder what it must've been like to experience major events throughout world history when reading about them in text books?

But if you take pause and actually think about it, we're living through many newsworthy current events that succeeding generations will be talking about long after we're gone.

Reading about them online or in newspapers is one thing. But seeing them happen unfold before our eyes is another.

Curious to hear from those who'll have anecdotes to tell in the future, Redditor FictionVent asked:
"What is the most historically significant event you witnessed IN PERSON?"

People recall the natural disaster events they've witnessed.

Tremors

"1964 Good Friday Earthquake 9.2 Richter. Was a boy in Cordova, Alaska at the time."

– KitchenLab2536

"My father was skipper of the USCG cutter stationed there. He was inport, and when the quake struck shortly before 5:30pm, he and my mom gathered me and my three siblings on the front porch. At first, it felt like the house was crumbling at the foundation, but on the porch we could plainly see our whole world was shaking. I remember watching telephone poles swaying, and the wires snapping and crackling in the street. The quake lasted about five minutes initially. My dad got his ship underway to avoid the tidal wave which was sure to come. We had several aftershocks in the coming weeks, some of which were quite strong, though nowhere near as strong or as long as the quake itself. I was seven at the time."

– KitchenLab2536

Collapsing Freeway

"October 17th, 1989. I watched the 880 Nimitz freeway collapse during the San Francisco earthquake. The Honda in front of me had the upper deck crush her front-end engine compartment. The mother and her daughter were shaken up but completely fine."

"I was driving a convertible Triumph Spitfire, which was scratched up slightly from debris. However, I walked away unscathed. Aside from the fact I pissed my pants, which I didn't notice until much later."

– CatDaddyWhisper

Thar She Blows

"I sat on the roof of our house and watched Mt. St. Helens erupt less than 100 miles away."

– stinkykitty71

"This must have been fascinating and terryfing in equal measure. What a thing to witness."

– runrossyrun

"It was amazing! The ash that covered everything like snow was interesting to kid me, but less so to my parents."

– stinkykitty71

People recall seeing major catastrophes as a result of malfunctions or judgement errors.

Bomber Crash

"The b-52 crash that led to changing what large military aircraft are allowed to do for airshows."

"I didn't see the plane, but immediately saw the fireball. It was just a perfect, bright red turning to black mushroom cloud."

"Fairchild is a nuclear air base and there were a few minutes there where I was sure the world was about to end."

"A few years before a KC-135 doing the same thing crashed near the school while we were in class."

– goffstock

Tragic Takeoff

"I was standing on my front porch watching the launch of the Challenger."

– StarChaser_Tyger

"Was riding in my parents car to a basketball game in the next town over in north texas when we saw a shooting star and thought that was neat."

"It was the Columbia..."

– Misdirected_Colors

Demolition Gone Wrong

"The failed implosion of the Zip feed mill in Sioux Falls, SD in 2005."

"They hyped it up, sold tickets to it, had a big 'BOOM' marketing thing, and broadcast it live on TV."

"The explosives took out the main supports on the first floor, and the rest of the building above it just plopped down 10ft or so and came to a rest. It was a massive failure, and was a funny little blurb on news stations around the world that day. Definitely not major news, just the rest of the world taking 20 seconds to laugh at us."

"The building sat like that (the leaning tower of SuFu) for quite a while until they figured out how to safely demolish it."

"Here's a clip of the failed demolition."

https://youtu.be/I8DEDUqd0RU

– KitchenBandicoots

These well-known historical events were seen by very few who are alive today.

Historical Remnant

"The tumbling of the Wall in Germany… along with people selling bits and pieces of it on tables in lobby in front of commissary and px in the following weeks and months. I had picked up a chunk about the size of an oreo and kept it… has blue spray paint on the flat side. Wonder if anyone is buying them now?"

– SingedPenguin13

Major Upheaval

"I would have to say the LA riots. I lived about two blocks from where it started. I was on my way home from school and saw someone throw a brick through a window. I didn’t even wait. I just started running the whole way home."

– Scarlaymama0721

Day Of Infamy

"9/11, I could SMELL the collapse of the towers."

– go4tli

"A friend of mine was there. One day in the warehouse we worked in together there was an odd electrical burning smell. He stopped in his tracks and went 'this is what 9/11 smelled like.'"

– mantistoboggan287

I didn't physically witness the fall of the World Trade Center but I was living in New York City at the time.

However, I did see the smoke.

I was living up north in Washington Heights at the time and knowing what happened, uncertain of what was to come, and seeing the plumes of smoke from the attack site was the most ominous sight I've ever seen in my life to date.

Have you ever lived through a historic moment or witnessed something sure to be noted in history books? Let us know in the comments below.

man in business suit standing near the stairs
Hunters Race on Unsplash

A job search is not fun, so most people will tolerate a lot to keep a job.

But everyone has their limit.

Sometimes that limit is reached right in the middle of a work day and people are forced to walk off the job with no prior notice.

Keep reading...Show less
groom in gray suit kissing bride in white dress
NIKITA SHIROKOV on Unsplash

Many weddings involve months of planning and thousands of dollars.

But the one guarantee in life is that poo happens and weddings are not immune to sh*t storms.

Natural disasters, unexpected illnesses, accidents or animosity can derail even the best laid wedding plans.

Keep reading...Show less

When I was in seventh grade, I had aspirations to be a poet. I made a Mother's Day card for my mom with a cute (but now, cringe-worthy) poem inside, and a hand-drawn picture of a rose that took me hours to perfect.

A friend saw the card and said they wished they could do the same. Then suddenly, she asked if she could buy the card from me. I said no, since I needed to give it to my own mother, but I said I could make her a copy. From there, my friend got the idea for me to make copies of the card to sell. I went along with it, mostly because I didn't think it would actually work.

Turns out, it did. After making sure people would actually be interested, we went to the library after school and made several color copies of my card for 10 cents each. The next day, we sold each card for $1. Not only did we make enough money so that my friend and I could both afford to get our moms an actual present in addition to the card, but we had enough leftover to put us over the top for the money we needed to buy the matching faux leather jackets we'd been wanting all year.

The next year, many people who bought cards asked me to do it again, so I did. Once again, we made a killing. We didn't try to do it again once we got to high school, but it was definitely fun while it lasted.

When we tell people this story, they think it's a pretty crazy money-making scheme. Maybe it is, but we're not the only ones who ever did anything like this. Redditors know all about crazy money-making schemes, and are eager to share their own stories.

It all started when Redditor primeiro23 asked:

"What are the craziest ways you’ve heard of people making money?"

Tumble Into Business

"In college, I take a class on how to start & run a small business. Prof tells us to think of ridiculous business models for our fictitious businesses as we will get more out of the class that way. Stupid ideas ensue. Selling paperclips door to door, refilling car gasoline tanks in people's driveways, service to read & summarize the newspaper to executives etc."

"One classmate decides he is going to sell tumbleweed."

"Guess who quits college and started a successful business? Tumbleweed guy. Takes a van to the desert, collects tumbleweed and sells them to Hollywood movie & TV studios who need them. Keeps the tumbleweed in a warehouse and since they never spoil, his only costs are gasoline, storage & a website. He eventually becomes the number one tumbleweed provider to studios around the world, shipping tumbleweed globally."

"Made a heap of money selling what millions of people drive by and ignore every year."

– Accomplished-Fig745

Synopses

"I did have a job reading and summarizing newspaper articles to the boss. Literally only task I was hired for."

– Draigdwi

"An actual union job in the film industry is reading scripts and summarizing them in short mean book reports."

– Trixiebees

Jump!

"Heard of crazier, but a guy I know, friend of my mother's, went to Texas 30+ years ago. (we are from Norway), and he noticed every single garden had a trampoline. And it was almost always "jump king" - the circular with blue mat ones."

"So he went to the HQ, bought 10 and took back to Norway. Within days they were sold, and he ordered 50 more, same thing. So he became the only importer and has God knows how many millions to his name today."

– alexdaland

"This IS wild. I went to Norway recently and one of the first things I noticed was that almost EVERY yard had a trampoline in it."

– TrulyMadlyCheaply

Working For A Home

"Back when Dogecoin took off I wrote a guide on recovering old lost wallets and it got so popular I was flooded with requests for further help. Some corrupted wallet files, some lost passwords, etc."

"I have a background in computer science and experience in data retrieval and password cracking, so I started helping people in exchange for a percentage cut (industry standard for wallet recovery). All above board with a contract and everything."

"For a while I was getting new clients every week and making hundreds up to thousands of dollars on every successful recovery (with a fairly good rate of success). The biggest one I ever recovered was a 19 letter long password someone had lost. The work dried up when the price of doge dropped but it got me the down-payment on a house."

– internetpillows

Horsing Around

"A cabbie in Dublin once told me a story about one of his fares who had a brilliant hustle."

"The guy was a sculptor. He would watch horse races, then when a horse won, he'd use social media to contact the owner directly with a digital mockup of a life-sized sculpture of the winning horse. Now, the people who own winning racehorses tend to be very rich - we're talking sheikhs, oligarchs, billionaires. Every now and again, one of these owners would bite, and spend €100,000 euros or so on a statue commemorating their animal's win."

"Dude only did a couple a year, and spent the rest of the time living the good life."

– escoterica

Sweet!

"Richest guy in a rich town near us makes enormous amounts of money buying Hershey bars and rewrapping them with customised retirement celebration designs or corporate logos to be given away at events. Literally just rewraps them in pieces of paper and doubles or triples his money."

"Every time I try to start a company or invent a better product or something, I ask myself why I’m not just rewrapping candy bars."

– perchance2cream

"F**k man, I think I found my new niche."

– LibertyPrimeIsASage

Slightly Used

"I went to college in a capitol C college town. A friend of mine bought an old school bus, fixed it up and took out all the seats."

"At the end of every semester she would drive around the neighborhood that was the fancier side of off campus living and collect whatever the rich kids were throwing out before they moved / went home for the summer. Flat screen TVs, couches, computers, tables, it was wild to see what people would chuck out and replace the next semester rather than having to deal with getting a storage unit or moving themselves."

"Sold it all on Craigslist over the summer or the beginning of the next semester and made a killing."

– sam_neil

Credit Where Credit Is Undue

"When I worked in a really busy, upscale restaurant my coworker would put all of his cash-paying customer’s bills on his credit card and keep the cash which he used to promptly pay off his credit card."

"He did this all day, every day for quite a while and the points started to add up and he was getting free airfare, etc."

"Worked great for a while until management notice a rise in credit card processing fees with an emphasis on one employee and they shut him down real quick."

– blinkysmurf

We Found Gold!

"My buddy worked his way through college by panning for gold. This was in 2009 in California. Most days he made nothing, occasionally he would come home with a couple hundred bucks worth and I think once he found a night worth over $1k."

– discostud1515

"My cousin had a metal detector when he was in HS. He would go every weekend down to the lake and take it with him on vacation. He found all kinds of things. He did find gold jewelry and would sell it online. He made so much money he bought his own car."

– Content_Pool_1391

Sleeping For The Job

"I knew a woman whose job was literally to sleep."

"A local office building owner wanted somebody on-site 24/7 to be the point of contact with first responders if they ever needed to be called. So they hired her to come in to the building in the evening when the maintenance crew was finishing their work. And she would settle up to sleep for the night in a bedroom they'd set aside for her. In the morning she'd hand the building back over to the office employees and go on about her day."

"No first responders were ever called. It's about the least stressful legitimate job I could ever imagine."

– CaptainTime5556

The Secret

"Back in the 90s, I knew a guy who put an ad in the classified section of the newspaper which read something along the lines of, “For $10, I’ll tell you my secret to making easy money. Send $10 cash to (address) to find out how.” People would send him $10 & he would then instruct them to put a classified ad in the newspaper telling people to send $10 & how to make money."

– freudianfalls

Accident Payment

"I was pushed down the stairs by a teen girl who told me to "pay attention and get out of her way" i ripped my dress during the fall and was getting back up when some guy rushed up to me, apologized for his daughter and handed me $500 as compensation."

– thebrilliantcounc

"LOL - years back, I was in a parking lot during a snowstorm. A guy was trying to pull around me, slid on the snow/ice and hit into my passenger side door. It really and truly was an accident. He was all apologies. We exchanged info - he said to get a quote and he would pay for the damage."

"Well, the car I was driving at the time was a crappy old Ford worth maybe $500. But, I went to a body shop, got a quote on the repair and it was $900. I faxed it to him (this was back in the 90's, LOL) thinking he'd tell me to go through the insurance company and just have the car totaled out."

"To my surprise, I had a bank check for $900 from him in my mailbox three days later. Now, I already owned another car, so I pocketed the $900, sold the smashed car for parts for $300 and ended up with $1200 on a car that was worth only $500 before the accident. I was very glad that he ran into me!"

– Deleted User

Only Feet

"I have a friend who sells pictures of her feet. In heels. Barefoot squishing cake. In mud. She charges extra for special requests. Has strict ‘no go’ rules. Never shows anything above the calf so she can’t be identified (no tats). All proceeds go to her kid’s college fund. Has made enough to fund a PhD."

– NotACrazyCatLadyx2

The things people do for money! But, I guess it works for her!