Hawaii missile alert

On Saturday morning a missile alert was pushed out from the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency and according to the Washington Post this was the cause:

Around 8:05 a.m., the Hawaii emergency employee initiated the internal test, according to a timeline released by the state. From a drop-down menu on a computer program, he saw two options: “Test missile alert” and “Missile alert.” He was supposed to choose the former; as much of the world now knows, he chose the latter, an initiation of a real-life missile alert.

I can’t imagine how a designer, developer, QA, and all the other links allowed something this bad to even make it into production. Much less something so important as a missile warning system.

I can’t imagine how scary it would have been to be on the island when this was pushed out and it makes me think of all the cold war bunkers we still have peppered around our nation. Back then I imagine everyone would have had the thought of dying at any minute in their mind. Which if we are honest is not necessarily a bad thing since it would keep your focus on what matters most to you.