FCC Vows Probe into False Alarm That Sent Hawaii Scrambling for Cover

Megalith

Megalith

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The FCC has announced that it will be opening a full investigation into yesterday’s false emergency alert, which led Hawaiians to believe they would be hit by a ballistic missile. The island’s officials say that the mistake was due to human error; no hacking was involved.

The state was only able to recall the alert 40 minutes after it was originally dispatched, which left fear-stricken residents in limbo awaiting catastrophe. In the incident's wake, a battery of officials that included Democratic Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, took to social networks to inform Hawaii residents and visitors that the alert was a mistake.
 
Difficult to fully eliminate human error. More likely, the backlash over this mistake is going to make people hesitant to activate the alert in the future - meaning that it will get activated too-late or not-at-all when there is a legitimate incoming missile.
 
The full investigation will be performed with the gusto that the fcc did for the DDOS attacks over Net Neutrality.
 
GotNoRice said:
Difficult to fully eliminate human error. More likely, the backlash over this mistake is going to make people hesitant to activate the alert in the future - meaning that it will get activated too-late or not-at-all when there is a legitimate incoming missile.
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You’re not wrong but the situation just reminds me of Stanislav Petrov. Disobeyed orders on a false alarm during the Cold War. Probably saved the world at the time. It’s a fine line we walk and honestly I’d rather see false alarms sending people to cover than ignoring a false alarm.

Just so long as we don’t preemptively retaliate.
 
The false alarm only taught people that in a real missile attack you are fucked and nothing you can do about it. forget getting to any true shelters. The roads gridlock and nobody is going anywhere.
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I just moved away from Hawaii a few months ago - glad I didn't go through this. Daughter who still lives in Hawaii said she slept through the whole thing.
 
I don't think that the alarm is really useful anyway as if there was a real missile incoming, you are fucked regardless of what you do. If I was in Hawaii and the alarm went off, I wouldn't do a thing as I would be dead anyway.
 
robble said:
The false alarm only taught people that in a real missile attack you are fucked and nothing you can do about it. forget getting to any true shelters. The roads gridlock and nobody is going anywhere.
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Same with the Tsunami alerts. Move to high ground with the tens of thousand others that are moving to high ground.
Better have your sneakers on.
 
[21CW]killerofall said:
I don't think that the alarm is really useful anyway as if there was a real missile incoming, you are fucked regardless of what you do. If I was in Hawaii and the alarm went off, I wouldn't do a thing as I would be dead anyway.
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Not true depending on the yield and how far you are you might be ok. And if you can get underground or in a strong building it would help your odds a lot. Your on an island grab a few scuba tanks and go under water for a few hours the water should protect your form most of the heat and blast wave as long as its not a water burst.
 
One of the upsides to this, is that they can identify who DIDN'T get the alerts, and address why...

Sure, it makes people wary, but an accidental alert. I'd take that over the alert system not working 11/10 times.
 
Penguincomp said:
hawii-jpg.50020
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[21CW]killerofall said:
I don't think that the alarm is really useful anyway as if there was a real missile incoming, you are fucked regardless of what you do. If I was in Hawaii and the alarm went off, I wouldn't do a thing as I would be dead anyway.
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I live a dozen miles or so West of STRATCOM. All the neighbors keep a 6 pack of beer on hand at all times. When the alarm goes off, we will bring lawn chairs and our beer and just sit and watch "the fireworks". The locals have it figured that the nuke they send there will be large enough to blow a hole many miles wide and at least two miles deep. You simply cannot run fast enough, and would probably just add to all the congestion on the roads anyway!
 
From the reports I saw on the news it only pointed out that the majority of people have no clue what to do if the alert goes off. Most people just stood around and wondered what to do. Why have an alert system if you don't inform the population what to do if the alert sounds?
 
man... if I had been there or any place with an "incoming missile alert" I ain't going to be hiding in a cellar or under a table...

you are well and truly boned at that point if you are not already 100 miles from anywhere or whatever... (maybe even then?)... whatever.


I'm going to get a pack of smokes and a bottle of whiskey and that will be that.. I live near Los Angeles ... ain't no way you are getting anything near useful away in the event of an attack... so **** it... i guess.
 
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jedijeb13 said:
From the reports I saw on the news it only pointed out that the majority of people have no clue what to do if the alert goes off. Most people just stood around and wondered what to do. Why have an alert system if you don't inform the population what to do if the alert sounds?
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Thats why i think it was somekind test to see how people react
 
jedijeb13 said:
From the reports I saw on the news it only pointed out that the majority of people have no clue what to do if the alert goes off. Most people just stood around and wondered what to do. Why have an alert system if you don't inform the population what to do if the alert sounds?
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well wondering around is about as useful as anything in the case of a missile alert...

I wonder if anyone lost their job or wrecked their marriage by telling people "truth" or what they actually think of them when they saw the alert..

dave: (to boss Ron): YOU ARE AN A***HOLE RON..

ron: you are fired..
 
I'll put my tinfoil hat on for two seconds

Potential false flag?
 
I would like to indicate that part 1 in the rulebook is to quite specifically not say "this is not a drill" if it is in fact a drill.
 
Getting indoors greatly increases you chance of not getting killed by a nuke depending on your distance to the detonation (because of thermal at first.) A nuke the size NK can make does not make a 2 mile deep hole, more like 200 ft. Considering winds and the fact that these are spaced out islands, the fallout probably wouldn't do as much damage as it would if it hit the rest of the states. One nuke, would basically effect 1/4 of one island out of the main Hawaii islands. http://nuclearsecrecy.com/nukemap/
 
tunatime said:
Not true depending on the yield and how far you are you might be ok. And if you can get underground or in a strong building it would help your odds a lot. Your on an island grab a few scuba tanks and go under water for a few hours the water should protect your form most of the heat and blast wave as long as its not a water burst.
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In theory that all sounds swell. But a bomb is more than just a blast. Bombs tends to cause fires, so if you come back up and half the island is on fire, you might die from smoke inhalation or other side effects caused by the initial explosion. There is no doubt that the wind will pick up all of the ash / debris and spread it everywhere. If something were to happen on Hawaii, California would almost certainly see some side effects from it.
 
who actually wants to survive the apocalypse... I mean I get the romantic notion of roaming around like madmax or whatever.. but more likely you will be knee deep in decomposing bodies, and it will smell worse than anything you can imagine.... and then you will die of Dysentery... pass

Unless... I could managed to be well out of urban areas with a bunch of supplies and an AMC Javelin AMX... then maybe


but mostly I think surviving the big one would kinda suck.. and you'd be likely to envy the dead pretty quickly...
 
.....so I guess that bomb warnings will now be set up the same way that launching an actual missile is. Two folks on opposite sides of a 'warning room' with codes and keys that must match before keys are turned together before the warning goes out. Means that the governor will call the alarm in. What happens if hes in the john when the warning is needed?

With the amount of time that the warning would give :confused:, its a consideration to not have the warning at all. Well there "is" the consideration of "missile babies for the survivors. Sex will be a minor consideration after the missile hits.:cool:
 
Ajit will have that authority blocked by next week and moved to a subscription based service..
Sorry you got no warning because you signed up for 3rd tier service.
 
jedijeb13 said:
...it only pointed out that the majority of people have no clue what to do if the alert goes off. Most people just stood around and wondered what to do...
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That is indeed what happened. Apparently very few people in Hawaii are prepared for any kind of attack. Foodland at least took their customers into the basement food storage area. But Walmart actually turned people away.
 
jedijeb13 said:
From the reports I saw on the news it only pointed out that the majority of people have no clue what to do if the alert goes off. Most people just stood around and wondered what to do. Why have an alert system if you don't inform the population what to do if the alert sounds?
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We live on an island with tens of thousands of people.

There are no shelters. There is no where to move to. There are no basements.

When the alarm woke us up my wife and I went back to bed. We’re within the instant death zone anyways.

When you hear the alarm you basically have 10 minutes. With how bad traffic is you’re 100% dead if you aren’t already on the north part of the island/ on one of the other islands.

So don’t give people crap for being clueless because they’re ultimately screwed anyways unless they can teleport.
 
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For all of the people saying that you can get to cover and so on, have you actually seen what the U.S. thermonuclear weapons did? Killed people dozens of miles away. The first one, Ivy Mike, removed an island from the face of the Earth.
 
S-F said:
For all of the people saying that you can get to cover and so on, have you actually seen what the U.S. thermonuclear weapons did? Killed people dozens of miles away. The first one, Ivy Mike, removed an island from the face of the Earth.
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The countries who would want to strike the US do not have thermonuclear technology.
 
Reminds me of when Dallas's tornado warning sirens were set off by a hacker
 
LOL there is no country on the planet that is dumb enough to launch a sneak attack using a nuke on the US, or any other country, as the resultant retaliation would mean utter ruin for said country. The only people who would use a nuke first are terrorists who would have to drive it to a location in the broken down trucks.

Now.. if there is another world war.. then that would change things.
 
This was human error, but not in the way they meant. The design was flawed. It should not be possible for a single person to click on a single button, followed by an "Are you sure?" button, to send out a message that could cause a public panic. If I had been in the loop on this design, I would have not signed off on it. Obviously this thing was thrown together quickly by people who had no CHI design experience.
 
I find myself wondering what the point of an alert system like this is. A nuclear warhead is coming to your neighborhood...wtf do you expect me to do about it? It's not like I can hide from it. I'm fucked either way. All it will do is create panic.
 
tunatime said:
Not true depending on the yield and how far you are you might be ok. And if you can get underground or in a strong building it would help your odds a lot. Your on an island grab a few scuba tanks and go under water for a few hours the water should protect your form most of the heat and blast wave as long as its not a water burst.
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You're forgetting the radiation. Water and big buildings won't do squat for that, and most forms of radiation from a nuclear warhead can melt human flesh.
 
from another article about it

The error occurred when, during a drill after a shift change, an employee made the wrong selection from a drop-down computer menu, picking the real-life missile alert instead of the test option, officials at Hawaii's Emergency Management Agency (EMA) said.

To prevent a repeat, two employees are now required to activate the alert system - one to issue the warning and another to confirm it, they said.
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so... a simple drop down menu, and click OK was all that was needed? LOL


and why wasnt 2 people needed before hand for such an alert??
 
HorseproofBacon said:
I find myself wondering what the point of an alert system like this is. A nuclear warhead is coming to your neighborhood...wtf do you expect me to do about it? It's not like I can hide from it. I'm fucked either way. All it will do is create panic.
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Pretty much. Anyone on Oahu is boned. They may as well not even notify us so people won't be in panic when they die. Just give the warning to the other islands.
 
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