Police Department Pulls Cutest April Fools' Joke With Adorable New K-9 Unit

In honor of April Fool's Day, a South Australian police department pranked the community it serves with a short video clip introducing a "new" K-9 unit—made up entirely of little dachshunds.

Titled "EXCITING NEW DOG OPERATIONS INITIATIVE," the video, which has been viewed more than 24,400 times on YouTube alone as of Thursday morning, was so convincing that the department has since released a statement clarifying that dachshunds will not actually be joining the force.

The video begins with a montage of German shepherds and Labrador retrievers making their rounds. In a voiceover, Sergeant Simon Rosenhahn of the Dog Operations Unit suggests the big dogs have limitations.

"We've always felt that there's been a bit of a gap in our capability, so we're really, really enthusiastic about announcing this new squad, the Small Area Urban Searching and Guided Evacuation Dogs," he says.

In the Reddit community r/funny, where a user with the handle ImAlwaysTilted_ shared the video with the caption: "My state's Police department made an April fools video," commenters were quick to point out that "S.A.U.S.A.G.E." is a perfect acronym for "Small Area Urban Searching and Guided Evacuation." It appears to be a nod to a common nickname for dachshunds, whose long, thin bodies resemble those of frankfurters.

The video then cuts to the apparent new recruits: three short-haired, brown dachshunds by the names of Tex, Snoop, and Gracie. Gracie is owned by Commissioner Grant Stevens, according to the department's website. Their small size, Rosenhahn says in the video, "makes them perfect for investigating small, enclosed spaces."

"It's been really hard work lifting those 40-kilo [about 88-pound] shepherds, especially above your head into ceiling spaces and things like that. Because of the size of these guys," he says, referring to the dachshunds, "we can chuck them into ceilings, up on top of cupboards, so they can have a good look around there."

In addition, he says, "We're also going to be able to attach them to drones, and that's really a game-changer for us. They can be tactically deployed from that—dropped down into people's yards and things like that."

The video was well-received online, though some were disappointed to learn dachshunds would not actually be monitoring the skies.

"Such a tease. You don't say attached to drones and not show me dogs attached to drones," one user commented.

However, the South Australian police are not discounting the possibility entirely.

"Who knows maybe this concept might actually work sometime in the future," the statement ends.