6 ms·

I woke up to this this morning on the island of Oahu. People running around on the street freaking out and police / fire engine sirens going off. Everyone che

by nstj 9y ago

I woke up to this this morning on the island of Oahu. People running around on the street freaking out and police / fire engine sirens going off. Everyone cheered when the “False alarm” SMS came through across the phones. Secure your networks people - this electronic psyops stuff is real.

harryh 9y ago
Apparently it was some sort of test gone wrong not a malicious intrusion into an insecure network.
- digi_owl 9y ago
  So basically someone left the test tape in the drive again? https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/nukevault/ebb371/ https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/nukevault/ebb371/
craftyguy 9y ago
Why are people running around in the streets freaking out when they are told to seek cover because there is an incoming missile?
- nstj 9y ago
  There’s not much of a consensus on “cover”, hence people seek insight on the concept from law enforcement officials. Is it cover when you’re inside but 30 floors up in a high rise?
  - f- 9y ago
    That is actually reasonably well-established - check out this: http://static3.businessinsider.com/image/58cc34b9112f7043268b4bb4-1151 http://static3.businessinsider.com/image/58cc34b9112f7043268... Not common knowledge, though, in part because nuclear hazards have been painted in an exaggerated light by Hollywood (basically, no point in trying to survive, because everybody is going to die and what's going to be left is a 1,000-year lethal nuclear wasteland), and in part because we stopped worrying after the end of the Cold War. Despite the goofy title, this is a remarkably good book from the 1960s, citing some actual science, that helps grasp the actual dangers and the survivability of nuclear attacks or accidents: http://www.madisoncountyema.com/nwss.pdf http://www.madisoncountyema.com/nwss.pdf PS. For folks interested in less apocalyptic emergency preparedness tasks, I maintain a handy guide: http://lcamtuf.coredump.cx/prep/ http://lcamtuf.coredump.cx/prep/
    - jimhefferon 9y ago
      Thank you for this. Any idea if the videos are easily viewable?
    - Hasz 9y ago
      Off topic, but the same guy (Michal Zalewski) has an absolutely amazing guide to his CNC work. http://lcamtuf.coredump.cx/gcnc/ http://lcamtuf.coredump.cx/gcnc/ For something a bit less depressing.
      - maxerickson 9y ago
        Note the "I maintain a handy guide" in the comment you replied to.
        Hasz 9y ago
        Ah, my bad. I figured the /prep/ guide and the /gcnc/ guide were distinct, but I see how you could take it a different way.
      - wglb 9y ago
        The same guy being f- above
    - eesmith 9y ago
      I live in a 5 story apartment with two basement floors, exactly as shown in the image. The bottom floor actually has a bomb shelter, in the area rated "200". I've often wondered, what does "protection" mean if the building has collapsed around us, so we're now 20 feet below ground, with a pile of rubble on top, and no way to get out? I don't think you should direct your ire towards Hollywood, at least not in any significant way. I don't think it was until "The Day After" (1983) that any movie showed anything like a realistic depiction of the aftermath of a nuclear war, and even that was deliberately downplayed. It surely wasn't a Hollywood depiction which caused Dorothy Day and others in 1955 to protest the "Operation Alert" drill, saying: > We will not obey this order to pretend, to evacuate, to hide. In view of the certain knowledge the administration of this country has that there is no defense in atomic warfare, we know this drill to be a military act in a cold war to instill fear, to prepare the collective mind for war. We refuse to cooperate. This "The Heritage Foundation" report from 1984 titled "The New Case for Civil Defense" also doesn't mention anything about Hollywood depictions. https://www.heritage.org/defense/report/the-new-case-civil-defense https://www.heritage.org/defense/report/the-new-case-civil-d... Finally, the NWSS book you cited says "American official policy, or at any rate the implementation of that policy, is based on the assumption that civil defense is useless." Again, I don't think that policy was influenced by Hollywood. (BTW, it's funny that Teller says "With the use of American automobiles an evacuation could be faster and more effective than is possible in Russia." - I guess he never saw a city trying to evacuate from a hurricane. Or the plans to evaluate NYC should there be a major disaster at Indian Point.) Instead, NWSS and The Heritage Foundation (and an essay I read by Freeman Dyson) all say the US policy of MAD was a much bigger influence. (I'm not going to get into a discussion of the validity of MAD. I only want to point out that I disagree with the idea that Hollywood depiction had much of a role.)
- alva 9y ago
  Because they believe they and their entire families are about to be turned to dust. I don't know if I would act rationally in that situation.
- dboreham 9y ago
  Because "seek cover" is known to be code for "you are about to die"?
- nsxwolf 9y ago
  Nobody teaches anyone about cover during a nuclear strike anymore. In fact, the concept is frequently mocked as cynical Cold War era propaganda.
  - djsumdog 9y ago
    The mocking isn't unjustifiable though. I mean the turtle/duck and cover is quite pointless, at least in the case of a nuclear strike (unless you're maybe on the far edge of it, in which case a ditch might save you..and that's big might). In the documentary "Iraq: The Untold Story", the creator shows civilian air raid shelters in Baghdad. They were four stories down, with the upper floors all reinforced concrete. Yet there were powerless against US bunker busting bombs, and the hundreds of civilians in the shelters that were hit all died.
    - Pinckney 9y ago
      Play around with NUKEMAP: http://nuclearsecrecy.com/nukemap/ http://nuclearsecrecy.com/nukemap/ If you are hit directly, you're fucked no matter what. But the fireball has relatively small radius compared to the other zones. Ducking underneath something solid is to protect you if the building collapses, which is likely to occur in the large air-blast radius. This is much like ducking under a desk in an earthquake. Cover will save you if you're within the larger thermal radiation radius. Even clothing can be enough to protect you from burns, so any cover you can get is good.
    - khuey 9y ago
      Cover is extremely important if you're outside the immediate fireball zone (where you're just going to be vaporized). You shouldn't infer from the fact that bunker busting bombs successfully bust bunkers that attempting to survive a nuclear explosion at some distance from you is pointless.
    - Houshalter 9y ago
      Have you ever looked at pictures of the aftermath of Hiroshima? People who weren't behind cover survived the immediate blast but got horrifying burns.
- Johnny555 9y ago
  Probably because they don't know where to take cover. Depending on how much time I have, if I had to take cover, I'd either load up supplies in the car and head to the 3rd underground floor of my office parking garage (but away from the vent stacks in 2 corners of the garage), or if I have less time, I'll jump the fence at the apartment complex next door and hide out in their one floor underground garage. I live in a wood-framed house, so it's going to provide less protection than an underground garage, though still better than running around the streets.
  - iends 9y ago
    Business insider says 37 minutes from North Korea to Honolulu. I imagine it’s only a few seconds difference between the various Hawaiian islands. However, you don’t really know how quickly the alert goes out. Do you estimate you’ll have more than 10 minutes notice?
mistersquid 9y ago
I was Facetiming with my gf when our session was "paused". She sent me a pic of notification on her phone. [0] Even more disturbing was the instructions of the initial warning which was to "hide in a safe place". Terrifying. [0] https://imgur.com/a/0QkgY https://imgur.com/a/0QkgY
sosborn 9y ago
What part of the island were you on? Out in Hawaii Kai no sirens sounded so it was a collective “meh, probably a mistake.”
- nstj 9y ago
  Waikiki - it was super confused here.
  - sosborn 9y ago
    That makes a lot of sense. What a shitty way to start a day.
breck 9y ago
In Ala Moana lots of people were looking out their windows but most people seemed to think it was just a mistake, and were waiting for more confirmation, from what I saw.
- JBlue42 9y ago
  That's pretty much how people reacted w/ the SpaceX rocket here in LA. Lots of videos of "What is that?" Jokes about NK, etc. People are more skeptical than we give them credit for. It's probably why in school we went through fire drills, tornado drills, etc. So you at least had some idea what to do and what it would be like.

by nstj 9y ago

harryh 9y ago

Apparently it was some sort of test gone wrong not a malicious intrusion into an insecure network.

digi_owl 9y ago
So basically someone left the test tape in the drive again? https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/nukevault/ebb371/ https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/nukevault/ebb371/

craftyguy 9y ago

Why are people running around in the streets freaking out when they are told to seek cover because there is an incoming missile?

nstj 9y ago
There’s not much of a consensus on “cover”, hence people seek insight on the concept from law enforcement officials. Is it cover when you’re inside but 30 floors up in a high rise?
- f- 9y ago
  That is actually reasonably well-established - check out this: http://static3.businessinsider.com/image/58cc34b9112f7043268b4bb4-1151 http://static3.businessinsider.com/image/58cc34b9112f7043268... Not common knowledge, though, in part because nuclear hazards have been painted in an exaggerated light by Hollywood (basically, no point in trying to survive, because everybody is going to die and what's going to be left is a 1,000-year lethal nuclear wasteland), and in part because we stopped worrying after the end of the Cold War. Despite the goofy title, this is a remarkably good book from the 1960s, citing some actual science, that helps grasp the actual dangers and the survivability of nuclear attacks or accidents: http://www.madisoncountyema.com/nwss.pdf http://www.madisoncountyema.com/nwss.pdf PS. For folks interested in less apocalyptic emergency preparedness tasks, I maintain a handy guide: http://lcamtuf.coredump.cx/prep/ http://lcamtuf.coredump.cx/prep/
  - jimhefferon 9y ago
    Thank you for this. Any idea if the videos are easily viewable?
  - Hasz 9y ago
    Off topic, but the same guy (Michal Zalewski) has an absolutely amazing guide to his CNC work. http://lcamtuf.coredump.cx/gcnc/ http://lcamtuf.coredump.cx/gcnc/ For something a bit less depressing.
    - maxerickson 9y ago
      Note the "I maintain a handy guide" in the comment you replied to.
      - Hasz 9y ago
        Ah, my bad. I figured the /prep/ guide and the /gcnc/ guide were distinct, but I see how you could take it a different way.
    - wglb 9y ago
      The same guy being f- above
  - eesmith 9y ago
    I live in a 5 story apartment with two basement floors, exactly as shown in the image. The bottom floor actually has a bomb shelter, in the area rated "200". I've often wondered, what does "protection" mean if the building has collapsed around us, so we're now 20 feet below ground, with a pile of rubble on top, and no way to get out? I don't think you should direct your ire towards Hollywood, at least not in any significant way. I don't think it was until "The Day After" (1983) that any movie showed anything like a realistic depiction of the aftermath of a nuclear war, and even that was deliberately downplayed. It surely wasn't a Hollywood depiction which caused Dorothy Day and others in 1955 to protest the "Operation Alert" drill, saying: > We will not obey this order to pretend, to evacuate, to hide. In view of the certain knowledge the administration of this country has that there is no defense in atomic warfare, we know this drill to be a military act in a cold war to instill fear, to prepare the collective mind for war. We refuse to cooperate. This "The Heritage Foundation" report from 1984 titled "The New Case for Civil Defense" also doesn't mention anything about Hollywood depictions. https://www.heritage.org/defense/report/the-new-case-civil-defense https://www.heritage.org/defense/report/the-new-case-civil-d... Finally, the NWSS book you cited says "American official policy, or at any rate the implementation of that policy, is based on the assumption that civil defense is useless." Again, I don't think that policy was influenced by Hollywood. (BTW, it's funny that Teller says "With the use of American automobiles an evacuation could be faster and more effective than is possible in Russia." - I guess he never saw a city trying to evacuate from a hurricane. Or the plans to evaluate NYC should there be a major disaster at Indian Point.) Instead, NWSS and The Heritage Foundation (and an essay I read by Freeman Dyson) all say the US policy of MAD was a much bigger influence. (I'm not going to get into a discussion of the validity of MAD. I only want to point out that I disagree with the idea that Hollywood depiction had much of a role.)
alva 9y ago
Because they believe they and their entire families are about to be turned to dust. I don't know if I would act rationally in that situation.
dboreham 9y ago
Because "seek cover" is known to be code for "you are about to die"?
nsxwolf 9y ago
Nobody teaches anyone about cover during a nuclear strike anymore. In fact, the concept is frequently mocked as cynical Cold War era propaganda.
- djsumdog 9y ago
  The mocking isn't unjustifiable though. I mean the turtle/duck and cover is quite pointless, at least in the case of a nuclear strike (unless you're maybe on the far edge of it, in which case a ditch might save you..and that's big might). In the documentary "Iraq: The Untold Story", the creator shows civilian air raid shelters in Baghdad. They were four stories down, with the upper floors all reinforced concrete. Yet there were powerless against US bunker busting bombs, and the hundreds of civilians in the shelters that were hit all died.
  - Pinckney 9y ago
    Play around with NUKEMAP: http://nuclearsecrecy.com/nukemap/ http://nuclearsecrecy.com/nukemap/ If you are hit directly, you're fucked no matter what. But the fireball has relatively small radius compared to the other zones. Ducking underneath something solid is to protect you if the building collapses, which is likely to occur in the large air-blast radius. This is much like ducking under a desk in an earthquake. Cover will save you if you're within the larger thermal radiation radius. Even clothing can be enough to protect you from burns, so any cover you can get is good.
  - khuey 9y ago
    Cover is extremely important if you're outside the immediate fireball zone (where you're just going to be vaporized). You shouldn't infer from the fact that bunker busting bombs successfully bust bunkers that attempting to survive a nuclear explosion at some distance from you is pointless.
  - Houshalter 9y ago
    Have you ever looked at pictures of the aftermath of Hiroshima? People who weren't behind cover survived the immediate blast but got horrifying burns.
Johnny555 9y ago
Probably because they don't know where to take cover. Depending on how much time I have, if I had to take cover, I'd either load up supplies in the car and head to the 3rd underground floor of my office parking garage (but away from the vent stacks in 2 corners of the garage), or if I have less time, I'll jump the fence at the apartment complex next door and hide out in their one floor underground garage. I live in a wood-framed house, so it's going to provide less protection than an underground garage, though still better than running around the streets.
- iends 9y ago
  Business insider says 37 minutes from North Korea to Honolulu. I imagine it’s only a few seconds difference between the various Hawaiian islands. However, you don’t really know how quickly the alert goes out. Do you estimate you’ll have more than 10 minutes notice?

mistersquid 9y ago

I was Facetiming with my gf when our session was "paused". She sent me a pic of notification on her phone. [0] Even more disturbing was the instructions of the initial warning which was to "hide in a safe place". Terrifying. [0] https://imgur.com/a/0QkgY https://imgur.com/a/0QkgY

sosborn 9y ago

What part of the island were you on? Out in Hawaii Kai no sirens sounded so it was a collective “meh, probably a mistake.”

nstj 9y ago
Waikiki - it was super confused here.
- sosborn 9y ago
  That makes a lot of sense. What a shitty way to start a day.

breck 9y ago

In Ala Moana lots of people were looking out their windows but most people seemed to think it was just a mistake, and were waiting for more confirmation, from what I saw.

JBlue42 9y ago
That's pretty much how people reacted w/ the SpaceX rocket here in LA. Lots of videos of "What is that?" Jokes about NK, etc. People are more skeptical than we give them credit for. It's probably why in school we went through fire drills, tornado drills, etc. So you at least had some idea what to do and what it would be like.