Hawaii Governor David Ige could have ended missile alert fiasco sooner — but he forgot his Twitter password
Updated
Hawaii's Governor knew almost immediately that a ballistic missile alert earlier this month was a false alarm but has admitted he could not let people know on social media earlier because he forgot his Twitter password.
Key points:
- David Ige says he is now putting Twitter account details into his phone
- Alert was sent during employee shift change at emergency management agency
- Mr Ige has apologised for the mistaken alert
"I have to confess that I don't know my Twitter account login and passwords," David Ige told reporters after giving his State of the State address, according to CNN.
"I will be putting that on my phone."
An emergency alert from the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency was mistakenly sent at 8:07am on January 13, warning locals and tourists to take immediate shelter.
"Ballistic missile threat inbound to Hawaii. Seek immediate shelter. This is not a drill," the alert, sent to mobile phones and aired on television and radio, read.
A revised alert informing of the "false alarm" did not reach mobile phones until nearly 40 minutes after the first warning was sent.
According to the Honolulu Star-Advertiser, Mr Ige said while he was not able to get into his Twitter account, he contacted officials at the emergency management agency.
"The focus really was on trying to get as many people informed about the fact that it was a false alert," he told the newspaper.
The warning triggered panic among residents, who gathered family members, ran out onto the streets and desperately sought shelter as they awaited the attack.
Mr Ige, who apologised after the mistake, said the alert was mistakenly sent during an employee shift change at the emergency management agency.
"It was a procedure that occurs at the change of shift where they go through to make sure that the system, that it's working. And an employee pushed the wrong button," he said, adding that such shift changes occur three times a day, every day of the year.
"I was awakened by the alert like everyone else here in the state of Hawaii.
"It was unfortunate and regrettable."
The executive officer of Hawaii's Emergency Management Agency revealed on Monday he would be retiring but said it had nothing to do with the mistaken alert.
The US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) announced shortly after the incident that it was investigating the false alarm.
"Based on the information we have collected so far, it appears that the Government of Hawaii did not have reasonable safeguards or process controls in place to prevent the transmission of a false alert," FCC chairman Ajit Pai said in a statement.
ABC/wires
Topics: world-politics, human-interest, unrest-conflict-and-war, hawaii, united-states
First posted
