There's a way you can listen to some US police and fire radio chatter without buying a scanner. Navigate to the Radio Reference website and select your state and county.

If you're lucky, some scanner operator will be uploading the stream of your police department's communications system. Then you can find out what's going on.

One day I heard the 911 dispatcher for our town announce that an elderly woman in rehab called 911 in order to get her daughter to bring her ice cream.

Another time a police car was driving slowly and shining the search light into people's backyards. I tuned in to discover...