A YouTube prankster freed by a fire crew after using Polyfilla to “cement” his head inside a microwave has been warned against risking his life for “other people’s entertainment”.
Senior officers at West Midlands Fire Service said they were “not going to charge” the man at the centre of the incident, footage of whose self-inflicted ordeal and subsequent rescue went viral.
Simon Woodward, a station commander, said the man’s life was in genuine danger, so the £650 deployment cost would not be levied.
However, in comments on the fire service’s Twitter feed, he added: “What I’d like to do is remind people not to put their lives at risk for the sake of other people’s entertainment.”
Mr Woodward also said: “If we’re attending incidents that are YouTube videos where we have people who’ve been irresponsible, those crews are unable to attend those life risk incidents.
“The service cost of that would be £650. We’re not going to charge, because his life was in danger.”
Footage of the man taking part in the irresponsible stunt attracted more than 850,000 views within 13 hours of being posted online.
The video provoked a storm of criticism online, with one describing the internet prankster, referred to as Jay in the video, as a “prat”, who should have been charged after tying up ambulance and then fire crews who had to extricate him.
West Midlands Fire Service said friends of the 22-year-old had spent 90 minutes trying to free him by the time emergency services were called at 1.49pm on Wednesday to the garage of a house in Fordhouses, Wolverhampton.
Watch Commander Shaun Dakin, who led the fire crew which responded, said: “All of the group involved were very apologetic, but this was clearly a call-out which might have prevented us from helping someone else in genuine, accidental need.”
Video of the stunt posted on YouTube shows the man claiming to be unable to breathe.
The ten-minute video also features adverts for clothing, and shows emergency crews arriving at the property and using a screwdriver to chisel off the Polyfilla.
The prankster, who also used the video to thank the fire crew, faced multiple calls by social media users to pay compensation to the fire service for wasting their time.
Twitter user Shinny messaged the fire service to say: “I hope you are billing him for the time wasted. The prat could have cost someone their life. Should have left him.”
Another member of the public wrote on Twitter: “I’m all for backing people on innocent mistakes – e.g. people getting stuck up a tree.
“But with stuff like this, it would be nice to be able to send them the bill for the costs.”