People in Bulgaria called the emergency number 112 a total of 37,090 times in the week of 18-25 September, up 5.7% from the same week last year. The figures come from a bulletin by the interior ministry's National 112 System Directorate.

Most calls — 13,803 — went to emergency medical centres. Callers reported fires 3,281 times, with more than 50 of those coming from the village of Mihaltsi, in the Hisarya area, because of a fire there on 23 September, the directorate said.

On Thursday, 24 September, 112 operators fielded a wave of calls about several fast-moving fires. One broke out on the outskirts of Samokov, near a forest of dry grass heading towards Dupnitsa on the road to the village of Belchin. Another started in a field in the village of Vrachesh, in the Botevgrad area. A third fire — grass, bushes and trees — burned next to the E772 road near the village of Ryahovtsite, in the Sevlievo area.

People called 2,083 times about road accidents, 9,737 times about crimes against people, and 963 times about crimes against property. There were 291 calls about breakdowns and accidents, 15 about household and industrial incidents, and seven about disasters.

Crews carried out six air ambulance missions during the week, the directorate said. In one of them, a woman with a leg injury was flown out from near the Sinanitsa hut in the Pirin mountains.

Operators logged 51 reports of dangerous driving and street racing, 361 about lost or stranded people, and 14 about illegal migrants and refugees.

They also handled 19 cross-border calls — to and from Spain, Romania, Germany, Poland, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands and Sweden — that needed police or emergency help to step in.

On 21 September at 12:34am, 112 received an automatic voice call reporting a crash. A car had hit a tree on the road between the villages of Borino and Chala, in the Smolyan region, the interior ministry's directorate said.

The week before, from 11 to 18 September, 112 received 37,516 calls, up 8.5% on the same period last year.