Part of the A1 was closed after an 'armless' prank wasted police time.

Officers were called after an 'eagle-eyed' driver spotted what looked like a severed hand in the central reservation of the A19 near Stockton.

Police attended and found that the suspicious object was a 'realistic looking' fake hand.

A post on facebook about the call-out received close to 300 comments, involving puns.

Cleveland police welcomed the clever play-on-words.

One facebook account claimed to have witnessed it 'first hand' while another said officers need to 'knuckle down' on this sort of joke.

Can you do any better?