BBC Radio 2 listeners have hit out Zoe Ball after the presenter fell for a scam story on her self-titled breakfast show on Thursday morning.
It wasn’t the scam itself that was the issue for listeners – it was the fact the 52-year old made light of the nature of the gag, which appeared to caused offence. Mother-of-two Zoe clearly wasn’t aware of the joke, which has been doing the rounds in similar guises on social media for several years, as she read out a spoof message live on air. The hoax concerns a missing drone “piloted” by a pet hamster.
Introducing the “shocking” message she had read online, Zoe began: “My 12-year old son has lost his drone. He was flying it in a park when he lost the signal in the direction of Aberavon – are you in this area? Do you know it well?”
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Quoting the listener, she continued: “Normally I wouldn’t be too bothered, but it turns out he had put his friend’s hamster in it as a test pilot and he’s a little bit upset. So we’re just wondering has anybody seen it.”
(Image: Getty Images)
With a mixture of both shock and laughter in the studio, clearly fooled by the hoax Zoe pondered: “Could he attach it [the hamster] to something? Is there a basket? I mean, is it like a Tom Cruise in Top Gun situation? There could be all sorts. I feel like we need to know more about this.
“If you are in the area have you seen a rogue drone? Have you found it in a bush? Was a hamster still attached? I feel we need updates on this story.”
(Image: Dave Benett/Getty Images)
Disgruntled listeners soon took to social media, however, to criticise the star for seemingly poking fun at an animal welfare issue. One wrote on X (formerly Twitter): “Actually, quite upset by the hamster in a drone story, be it a joke or not. Why laugh at that if you thought it genuine at first? Really disappointed this was raised and presented as funny.”
Another commented: “@ZoeTheBall @bbcradio2 stories about list drones with hamsters attached is not funny and encourages other kids to treat animals badly. Bum note I’m afraid. @RSPCA_official.”
It’s not been a particularly great month so far for Zoe, who saw firefighters rush to her £1.5million home after she left a candle burning. The former Strictly: It Takes Two host revealed the terrifying news on her show on October 3: “Something that happened to me for the first time was that yesterday, the fire brigade went to my house,” she said.
(Image: Dave Benett/Getty Images)
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“I had left a candle burning in the lounge. I was so obsessed with The Matrix and the fact that I had made a cake on Sunday, I had gone out and hadn’t blown out one of the candles. It was left smouldering in the lounge and at 9.25am my smoke alarms went off and thank goodness! Otherwise I might have gone home to no home!
“Thank you to my neighbour Abs and my gorgeous Em who called the fire brigade and I’d like to give a big shout out to Duncan and the Uckfield boys, Joe and Cameron and Steve, who went around, put out the candle and stopped my house from burning down.”
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Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk
