On the morning of January 13th the people of Hawaii had a little scare when they received a warning of an incoming ballistic missile in bound to the islands.

This was particularly scary because this false alarm went off and wasn’t officially corrected until a whole 38 minutes passed. In the wake of the panic, people feared for their lives; putting their children in manholes and hiding in shelters.there was panic across Hawaii, with people fleeing on the street.

The incident was reported as a human error, and many people are very upset due to the outcome in the wake of the panic. Many people had to abandon their cars and one individual even had an earthquake.

“It was really scary,” said senior Austin Aiona. “ My family there didn’t know if they would live in the next half hour.”

The incident was reported as an error by the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency through twitter at 8:20 A.M; however, the official response wasn’t sent out for over a half hour. However, the notification warnings that appeared throughout all the phones in Hawaii was corrected at approximately 8:13 P.M.

“I think it’s really irresponsible to let something like this happen,” said senior Jack Deane “Especially as long as it took to take the notice down”.

This was an enormous error from the government. Madison Park, a CNN reporter, stated how this error created doubt within the public. The error shook the American public’s confidence in the emergency alert system, as well as the authorities ability to competently and properly alert its citizens. This error came at one of the worst times imaginable, due to the tensions with North Korea.

“ They need to be more careful,” said Senior Maylynn Lee “ If they want to effectively warn the people”.

Something needs to change on the effectiveness of their warning systems in order to securely help their citizens. This incident surely diminishes the confidence in their warning system and their process.