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Fake 'Inbound Missile' Alert Sent To Every Cellphone in Hawaii (chicagotribune.com)
"Somebody sent out a false emergency alert to all cell phones in Hawaii saying, 'BALLISTIC MISSILE THREAT INBOUND TO HAWAII. SEEK IMMEDIATE SHELTER. THIS IS NOT A DRILL'," writes Slashdot reader flopwich, adding "Somebody's had better days at work." The Associated Press reports:
In a conciliatory news conference later in the day, Hawaii officials apologized for the mistake and vowed to ensure it will never happen again. Hawaii Emergency Management Agency Administrator Vern Miyagi said the error happened when someone hit the wrong button. "We made a mistake," said Miyagi. For nearly 40 minutes, it seemed like the world was about to end in Hawaii, an island paradise already jittery over the threat of nuclear-tipped missiles from North Korea...
On the H-3, a major highway north of Honolulu, vehicles sat empty after drivers left them to run to a nearby tunnel after the alert showed up, the Honolulu Star-Advertiser reported. Workers at a golf club huddled in a kitchen fearing the worst... The Hawaii Emergency Management Agency tweeted there was no threat about 10 minutes after the initial alert, but that didn't reach people who aren't on the social media platform. A revised alert informing of the "false alarm" didn't reach cellphones until 38 minutes later, according to the time stamp on images people shared on social media.
On the H-3, a major highway north of Honolulu, vehicles sat empty after drivers left them to run to a nearby tunnel after the alert showed up, the Honolulu Star-Advertiser reported. Workers at a golf club huddled in a kitchen fearing the worst... The Hawaii Emergency Management Agency tweeted there was no threat about 10 minutes after the initial alert, but that didn't reach people who aren't on the social media platform. A revised alert informing of the "false alarm" didn't reach cellphones until 38 minutes later, according to the time stamp on images people shared on social media.
I'm thinking it may not have been so accidental. This is possibly the only way to get good data on how effective the warnings are. My guess: not very effective at this point. But someone higher up needed that data to complete his that assessment regarding war with the Koreans.
"Purely a state exercise" is disavowing all knowledge and responsibility at the Federal level. Translation: "We're staying out of this one."
On the 24th floor of a Waikiki Beach condo balcony having coffee when the alert came on my cell. First reaction...WTF?? Second reaction... went straight to the roof. If it's gonna go down, I want to see it (if only for a few milliseconds).
What, me worry?
Agreed, it was a false alert, not a fake one.
How is the Riemann zeta function like Trump rallies? Both have an endless number of trivial zeros.
I grew up in the 60s and 70s. I remember some of the cold war films they showed us in school. According to them:
Stay indoors. If you’re close enough to the blast, you’re probably dead anyway (that was mostly just implied). For many more people, though, fallout is going to be the main worry - so stay inside. And even if you still have running water... you probably shouldn’t drink it. Use what’s already in the back of the toilet and in your hot water heater.
Of course nowadays, post 9/11, most reservoirs are supposedly covered - so I have no idea if that’s as important.
In any case, water is probably going to be the main short term issue. If you have some pre-blast warning, filling up as many containers as possible with water is a good idea.
#DeleteChrome
Or, this was real but neutralized and then disavowed with a cover story.
I'm pretty sure the feds wouldn't send a nationwide alert for a localized threat. Initiating mass panic is dangerous enough over a small area.
Bring them to shelter. People have survived nuclear attacks before, no doubt they will in the future as well. If you avoid being killed by the initial blast and radiation you want to shelter from the fallout, most of which fades in two weeks.
Survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
Fallout Protection - What to Know and Do about Nuclear Attack
Nuclear Strike Drills Faded Away In The 1980s. It May Be Time To Dust Them Off
Nuclear weapons and their effects operate according to the laws of physics, not magic. The physics, effects, and countermeasures are known.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
Why do you imagine that the only way the message could be sent to every phone is to have a list of all phone numbers? I suspect the system relies on beacon signals broadcast from cell towers that every cellphone within range picks up, displays the message, then stores a record of the alert for a pre determined period of time (24 hours), after which the alert is ignored.
Do you really imagine the system sends out several million simultaneous text messages? Why just send a message to every device within range?
Ken
There should be more of this in the US. Lots more. In fact, we should reinstate bi-yearly air raid drills for schools and businesses. For everyone within 100 miles of a strategically important target. That would be 95% of the population I bet. Remember that the nukes are wayyyyyy more powerful nowadays? It needs to be made perfectly clear to the US population that if our great leader pops his top and starts a nuclear confrontation, people have a 10% chance of survival, and that's only IF they manage to get to a shelter. A ton of people in this country have forgotten that the world is connected. They think that they can just ignore the rest of the world and they will be fine. Personally, I think that a lot of this has to do with the fact that WW2 is fading into the rearview mirror. Up until the last decade, there were a lot of vets from that war still around. People who were actually in Japan after the bombs and saw it with their own eyes. Lots of people who lost friends and family members fighting overseas. The population generally understood that what happens on the other side of the planet can come home to roost on their own doorsteps. We've largely forgotten this, and we elected an unstable, unqualified, angry leader and put him in charge of the nuclear arsenal. Because hey, we don't really believe anymore that what happens on the other side of the world can actually impinge on our lives in any real way. The entire US population needs a brutal reminder of how small the world actually has become. We all ought to spend some time practicing the soothing art of putting our heads between our legs and kissing our asses goodbye. Let all those conservative rural parents and grandparents spend some time answering awkward questions from the kids about the air raids drills they get at school.
In the history of forever, whenever bureaucracies fuck up - 'blame the new guy'. Someone thought it was a good idea and did it, likely for political reasons, it went down way worse than they thought and... So what was the follow up marketing meant to about, obviously stoking war fears, real war fears. Who was playing, drive war fears as an FCC distraction, make more War Industrial Complex funding more palatable, attack property values in Honolulu (Pearl Harbour is the number one target in the US and make no mistake but why force the reminder).
They had better show some images of this magic, make an entire city panic, cause harm and suffering and even death as people try to escape, button with no safety features, otherwise I just wont believe. They were going to try something on, they still might in the next few weeks, some kind of PR=B$ stunt to push an agenda.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
The US gov/mil needed to see what the US population would do in that state and all over the USA, globally given a simple cellphone message for a set time. :)
How would all diplomats in the USA react? Calls made, messages sent. Reactions in their embassy, communications used from their embassy out of the USA.
Spies been watched by the FBI all over the USA react in any way at all?
Do US survivalist have any national or global messaging system that was not yet under constant FBI/NSA/CIA watch?
What did average survivalist do? Drive out to their bug out location? Stay at work? Why? Did they know it was a test? Nice way to find out who they are and who got seen on CCTV, via cell phone tracking driving around in a very different way after the message
Did the message get repeated on unexpected and unknown communications networks? Totally new systems and unknown people who held back for just such a warning that had not been tracked by the NSA, CIA, GCHQ, FBI in the past?
Ham radio, cell phone, telephone numbers, IRC, forums, social media, changes to web sites, visits to strange web sites by many people? Different, direct messages to unexpected and new militia groups all over the US once thought to be isolated in their states?
Was the message a long conversation? A word? A number? Who passed it on locally deeper into the USA? Hops to different very networks all over the USA.
Such unexpected and urgent communications would have been a real time study for the FBI, NSA uncovering all kinds of survival and militia groups that stayed so well hidden for so long only to be detected USA wide by one simple message.
40 mins gave the study time to keep tracking all the people with "plans" all over the USA. Spies, embassy workers, US militia groups, cults, faith groups, dual citizens, survivalist, people in the US mil/gov/contractors, police might have done something very interesting for 40 mins.
Who stayed at their job in the US mil/gov/police? Who phoned their kin, strangers when they should not due to gov/mil secrecy? Who got a message and/or responded to someone they never had contact with in the past?
One message gave the FBI, US mil, police and NSA years of information on their workers, contractors, staff, special forces. Who made calls to tell people it was all a test...
Who stayed loyal to the US mil/gov and who was talking to people.
Now the US gov knows who will do what in time of war.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"