In September 2014, the National Weather System sent out a false tsunami alarm, triggering tsunami warning sirens in Homer. As happened last Saturday in Hawaii when a technician clicked the wrong box on a program and sent out text alerts of an impending missile attack, the 2014 glitch also happened when a live code got sent out inadvertently. With increased tension over a possible nuclear missile attack from North Korea, those events raise the question: Could a false alert of a missile attack be sent out in Alaska, and if so, how fast would it be corrected? Chances are slim that local authorities would send out a false message like the one that sent Hawaii residents into a panic, Dan Nelson, program manager at Kenai Peninsula Borough Office of Emergency Management, said.
“We’re confident that a similar event such as what happened in Hawaii won’t happen here,” he said.