Police are investigating reports of a “nine-person fight” following a parking dispute.

News of the fight emerged when Cambridgeshire Police released a recording of 999 calls to its control room between 16:00 and 21:00 on Friday.

The incident occurred in Peterborough just before 6.30pm that day; One caller reported seeing someone with a knife.

Police stated that they suspected a fight and said that the investigation was ongoing.

During the five-hour 999 “postathon”, call handlers received 227 calls.

One of them said his ex-partner was “outside their house with gas cans”, while another reported a man “dancing” on the highway.

In another call, police said someone involved a missing Amazon package, while another reported someone placed children’s toys and cushions on top of a trash can.

Twenty calls were silent and five were believed to be “cell” calls.

In response to several calls on Friday, police said:

• The man who was “dancing” on the highway was “taken to safety” by police officers.
• The investigation into the former partner’s tip about the gas cans was “ongoing”. Police said a “suspect” left the area and the “victim” was “talked to by officers.”
• A report of an “intentional fire” at Peterborough prison was being “investigated”.
• Concerned about his missing Amazon package, the man was “advised to call 101”, a non-emergency number.

Supt Nick Church said: “We often hear about frontline officers, but we rarely hear about the hard work and resilience of our control room staff, who are on hand 24 hours a day to assist members of the public when they need police assistance.

“This ‘postathon’ was important to raise awareness of the volume of calls we receive, but also to demonstrate the diversity and complexity of some of the incidents we deal with.”