Public Health Emergency Risk Communication and Social Media Reactions to an Errant Warning of a Ballistic Missile Threat - Hawaii, January 2018

MMWR. Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report
Bhavini Patel MurthySara J Vagi

Abstract

On January 13, 2018, at 8:07 a.m. Hawaii Standard Time, an errant emergency alert was sent to persons in Hawaii. An employee at the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency (EMA) sent the errant alert via the Wireless Emergency Alert (WEA) system and the Emergency Alert System (EAS) during a ballistic missile preparedness drill, advising persons to seek shelter from an incoming ballistic missile. WEA delivers location-based warnings to wireless carrier systems, and EAS sends alerts via television and radio (1). After 38 minutes, at 8:45 a.m., Hawaii EMA retracted the alert via WEA and EAS (2). To understand the impact of the alert, social media responses to the errant message were analyzed. Data were extracted from Twitter* using a Boolean search for tweets (Twitter postings) posted on January 13 regarding the false alert. Tweets were analyzed during two 38-minute periods: 1) early (8:07-8:45 a.m.), the elapsed time the errant alert circulated until the correction was issued and 2) late (8:46-9:24 a.m.), the same amount of elapsed time after issuance of the correction. A total of 5,880 tweets during the early period and 8,650 tweets during the late period met the search criteria. Four themes emerged during the early period: informati...Continue Reading

References

Nov 1, 2015·The Journal of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh·A L ChapmanC J Chapman

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Citations

Dec 30, 2020·Health Security·Bhavini Patel MurthyRachel Nonkin Avchen

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Software Mentioned

EAS
WEA
ti
Atlas
Sysomos †

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