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  #1  
Old 01-13-2018, 06:33 PM
1neeto 1neeto is offline
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Default A cellphone alert told me that I had 15-20 minutes to live...

Not sure if you’re all up to date, but this morning at 8:00am HST an alert was sent to most cellphones advising everyone to immediately seek shelter because there was an incoming missile headed to Hawaii. I was at a place that had no concrete shelter, and it would make no sense to try and hit the road and seek for one. I was with my wife and at a beautiful place, and I did not panic, I kept collected and started to see if the threat was real or a mistake.

And just when I was going to accept that maybe this is it, and was about to make some important phone calls, a statement was released that it was a mistake, that someone “pressed the wrong button”.

What I learned from this is that the threat of imminent death is not as scary as I thought. And that the local government is nowhere near prepared for something like this. It took nearly 40 minutes for the official all-clear. That’s just absolutely unacceptable.
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Old 01-13-2018, 06:40 PM
H165 H165 is offline
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That alert did make world news today.

I would think about 50 people would be fired in the wake of this inaccurate alert.

Must have made for an interesting day........
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Old 01-13-2018, 07:22 PM
1neeto 1neeto is offline
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That alert did make world news today.



I would think about 50 people would be fired in the wake of this inaccurate alert.



Must have made for an interesting day........


It was a very interesting 20 minutes or so. The official story is that there was a drill going on and someone pressed the wrong button, and the failsafe prompt failed too! It makes no sense, and all I can hope is that someone answers for this.
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Old 01-13-2018, 07:34 PM
Pitar Pitar is offline
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That alert did make world news today.

I would think about 50 people would be fired in the wake of this inaccurate alert.

Must have made for an interesting day........
As a kid we had practice drills for incoming Russian ICBMs. These were military air base grade school drills where the teacher would suddenly announce the drill and the kids would react by pushing all the desks towards the window and then crawl under them as if to avoid flying glass. Then the all clear was announced and the room returned to normal.

My pop was a nuclear bomber pilot and disappeared during the Cuban Missile Crisis. He was sent off to a base on the European continent from where he'd fly up and down the Russian border with a belly full of nukes waiting for orders to penetrate and head for designated targets.

When I was all growed up and a soldier in the air force I had to practice similar drills where I'd generate an airplane for immediate take-off. Then, taxiing down towards the runway coded orders came in to either take off or stand down. What we did know was some missions were one-way and those we would not know until airborne.

I'm all kinds of used to imminent danger hype. I think more of the same "mistakes" should be common place. Nothing like a population of galvanized individuals to see how petty their little first world problems are and bring sobriety to humanity. But, that's me. I'm not PC.
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Old 01-13-2018, 09:06 PM
FOG01 FOG01 is offline
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I'm wondering why a button of that magnitude would be placed such that it could be pressed by "mistake."
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Old 01-13-2018, 09:35 PM
Long Jon Long Jon is offline
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I'm wondering why a button of that magnitude would be placed such that it could be pressed by "mistake."
I know ! It’s right between the coffee machine and the snack dispenser, not even recessed or anything....

Sorry Neeto , not trying to make light of your terrifying experience. Hard to imagine how I’d feel in that situation.
The shock may still hit you some time later.
Best wishes, Jon
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Old 01-13-2018, 10:39 PM
Steve DeRosa Steve DeRosa is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Pitar View Post
As a kid we had practice drills for incoming Russian ICBMs. These were military air base grade school drills where the teacher would suddenly announce the drill and the kids would react by pushing all the desks towards the window and then crawl under them as if to avoid flying glass. Then the all clear was announced and the room returned to normal...

I'm all kinds of used to imminent danger hype. I think more of the same "mistakes" should be common place. Nothing like a population of galvanized individuals to see how petty their little first world problems are and bring sobriety to humanity. But, that's me. I'm not PC.
Had the same thing when I was in elementary school, along with "shelter dispersal drills," where you had to be personally picked up/signed out by a parent or other mature adult blood relative (no neighbors/siblings/cousins - good luck trying that today ), and routine testing of air raid sirens...

Fringe benefit was that we acquired an acute awareness of, and interest in, places/events/individuals outside our own immediate world, along with the ability to cultivate informed, reasoned opinions about same - something which, in 30+ years as a classroom teacher, I found sorely lacking in far too many of my students (and, sadly, their parents)...

I'd like to think I did something to rectify, at least in some small part, this unfortunate situation; thankfully everything worked out for the best today - I genuinely loved my kids, and I'd hate to think their last mortal act was texting a smiling selfie with overhead incoming fire in the background to Connor, Megan, and Ashley...
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Old 01-13-2018, 10:55 PM
Gmountain Gmountain is offline
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When I was a kid we had to bring Metrecal cookies to school on the first day. They put our name on them and they were stored in the fallout shelter in the basement. We would get them back on the last day of school.

Grade school had a lot of duck and cover drills and air raid drills. We had air raid drills even when I was in high school.

I remember laying in bed at night and hearing the fighters power up their engines and take off and go supersonic right away.

We would go to the beach and see the Soviet "trawler" spy ships off shore.

I guess the point is that we had a civil defense plan. Maybe it's time they start thinking about one, and what happened in Hawaii probably gave planners some good ideas.
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Old 01-14-2018, 12:50 AM
Neil K Walk Neil K Walk is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Pitar View Post
As a kid we had practice drills for incoming Russian ICBMs. These were military air base grade school drills where the teacher would suddenly announce the drill and the kids would react by pushing all the desks towards the window and then crawl under them as if to avoid flying glass. Then the all clear was announced and the room returned to normal.

My pop was a nuclear bomber pilot and disappeared during the Cuban Missile Crisis. He was sent off to a base on the European continent from where he'd fly up and down the Russian border with a belly full of nukes waiting for orders to penetrate and head for designated targets.

When I was all growed up and a soldier in the air force I had to practice similar drills where I'd generate an airplane for immediate take-off. Then, taxiing down towards the runway coded orders came in to either take off or stand down. What we did know was some missions were one-way and those we would not know until airborne.

I'm all kinds of used to imminent danger hype. I think more of the same "mistakes" should be common place. Nothing like a population of galvanized individuals to see how petty their little first world problems are and bring sobriety to humanity. But, that's me. I'm not PC.
In this we agree. We did not have those drills but my service ended with the Cold War nearly 30 years ago. It amazes me how naive people can be nowadays. Life may have many more conveniences but if anything it’s gotten more complicated with information overload and widespread misinformation.
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Old 01-14-2018, 02:59 AM
1neeto 1neeto is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Long Jon View Post
I know ! It’s right between the coffee machine and the snack dispenser, not even recessed or anything....

Sorry Neeto , not trying to make light of your terrifying experience. Hard to imagine how I’d feel in that situation.
The shock may still hit you some time later.
Best wishes, Jon

It’s all good. I a lot of people totally freaked out and went full-on panic. I think because of the paper I was, I knew there was absolutely nothing I could do but hope for the best.

And here’s to make some light humor off this: 🤣
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Old 01-14-2018, 03:51 AM
Mandobart Mandobart is offline
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I grew up in Los Alamos, NM. My dad worked in the nuclear weapons program. In our minds we would be one of the first targets of a Soviet attack (probably not likely in fact - incoming missiles would actually target military communications and actual weapons not weapons development labs). The area was riddled with natural and man- made shelters. When I grew up I spent about 8-1/2 years in the USN on attack subs. Our job was finding and eliminating Soviet missile subs. So glad we never actually came to that. In submarine warfare there are no second chances - your first salvo allows your adversary to pinpoint your position. We had to be continuously ready to perform our mission but also ensure we didn't make the wrong call and start WW III erroneously.

A chilling account of one person's theory concerning a time when Hawai'i may have actually been targeted for a nuclear attack can be read in Red Star Rogue.
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Old 01-14-2018, 04:10 AM
Scootch Scootch is offline
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At least the mistake was made by someone on the warning system and not on the launching system.
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Old 01-14-2018, 06:22 AM
Dru Edwards Dru Edwards is offline
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I wonder why it took 40 minutes to resolve the mistake?
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Old 01-14-2018, 07:14 AM
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Mr. Jelly Mr. Jelly is offline
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Here we go. Maybe it was actually done on purpose to monitor how people react. It doing this they now know how the population will respond and how to deal with it. Along with the deadening affect it now has caused by making people think that it is probably a mistake the next time they get an alarm. It can't happen here is what most think or at least feel. If they did believe that it is something that is going to occur I would guess they would be a little more active with their interactions with their government.
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Old 01-14-2018, 07:32 AM
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Bob Womack Bob Womack is offline
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We used to protect these systems by making them activated by two hardware key-operated switches that had to be switched simultaneously, keys entrusted to two different people, switches spaced apart so that no single individual could reach both. Thus two people had to be involved, had to agree to the necessity of the action, and had to work together as a team in order to trigger the event.

We're too smart for that these days.

Bob
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