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This is a test of…

Britain has never had a nationwide emergency alert system. They’re about to get one and they’re flipping out about it.

Sunday, April 24th everyone’s smart phone is going to make what has been described as “a very loud noise” for ten seconds, or until acknowledged by the user. There has been speculation that people will drive off the road or have heart attacks. There are concerns that the government is harvesting who does (and doesn’t) have a smart phone.

It does seem a little pointless (and therefore a little sinister). Britain has very placid weather.

It doesn’t have earthquakes, a tornado alley, wildfires to speak of or a hurricane season. Some flooding, but you can usually see that coming. They had a couple of apparent tsunamis in the Middle Ages – at least, the sea snuck in and ate a couple of villages. They were never quite as directly threatened in the Cold War, though last year Vlad did promise to nuke London first if the current thing goes sour.

In the end, probably a nothingburger. Instructions are making the rounds how to claw the app out of the guts of your phone, though the article I linked said you can just turn your phone off.

I’ll probably decide to experience it. Curiosity and all that.

Comments


Comment from Uncle Al
Time: April 3, 2023, 7:52 pm

No earthquakes or tornados, true, but you do have football hooligans and “direct action” environmentalists. They definitely qualify as emergencies.


Comment from Durnedyankee
Time: April 3, 2023, 8:05 pm

We get em all the time, Amber Alerts for stolen kids have a short series of grindy burps, national weather alerts ( twisters, hail, flash flooding, and so on) have a solid tone.

Heard an Amber alert half an hour ago, and the weather alert tone last Friday when Little Rock Ark. got whacked by the tornadoes.

P!us the periodic tests the stations have to run.

The panic needs to get a grip, just an annoying noise.


Comment from Pupster
Time: April 3, 2023, 8:10 pm

I get Amber Alert notices on every phone in the house…like I’m freakin Batman or something. It started out with Tornado warnings, then it was severe weather warnings, then Amber (children possibly abducted) alerts, then “at risk adults” missing, before long it will be have you seen this dog/cat/chicken notices.

What am I supposed to do with this information? I’m able to turn off most of these but I feel like I should be looking down on the city from the ledge of a tall building, monitoring the situation.


Comment from ExpressoBold Pureblood
Time: April 3, 2023, 8:17 pm

We (the USA) got a national emergency notification once. It was during the first administration of the Once and Future President, Donald Trump.

If I remember correctly, it was just to test out the system and not to alert conservatives to Democrat fraud and lies.

Have you ever noticed that most of the things Democrats predicted Donald Trump would do are the things that Joe Biden has “accomplished?” I bet the White House is a funky place to work now!


Comment from QuasiModo
Time: April 3, 2023, 8:56 pm

We don’t get much in eastern Canada…the odd ice storm, sometimes a powerful destructive wind, rarely a tornado, sometimes a bit of flooding. Had a couple of little earthquakes…more just a good conversation piece.

The globalists want Ukraine for themselves without all the pesky Ukrainians, so they’re gonna drag out the war until they’re all gone then force the west to rebuild it to their specifications and then they’ll move in.


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: April 3, 2023, 9:53 pm

Pups, can we elect you Batman?


Comment from Some Viking Vegetable
Time: April 3, 2023, 10:27 pm

🎶 Longer boats are coming to win us
They’re coming to win us, they’re coming to win us
Longer boats are coming to win us
Hold on to the shore, they’ll be taking the key from the door.

Dirty Scandis are up to their old tricks!


Comment from Clifford Skridlow
Time: April 3, 2023, 11:17 pm

Here in Central Texas, we get them all the time, seemingly in direct proportion to your interest in what they are interrupting. We got one earlier today for a missing 5 year old kid that went missing from a town close to 200 miles from where we are, right at the best part of the movie I was watching. They better hope I don’t find the little brat . . .


Comment from Durnedyankee
Time: April 4, 2023, 12:15 am

@Skridlow, that’s the one I heard earlier. I’m with you, alerting us in North Central Texas about stuff in El Paso seems a trifle useless. This ain’t Rhode Island where you can drive back and forth across the state a couple times in the time it would take to go from Dallas to Austin.


Comment from OldFert
Time: April 4, 2023, 12:47 am

Cliff and Durned.
I was able turn most of that stuff off on my phone, but TV still beeps for lost old folks in north Georgia (many miles from here).
But the ones that take the cake are the ones (often near Atlanta, about 250 miles away) where a kid is picked up by a noncustodial parent. They give the car description and vicinity of the situation.
I’m sure to see that car in my cul-de-sac, nowhere near a main road, 200-400 miles from where the incident took place.


Comment from technochitlin
Time: April 4, 2023, 12:54 pm

The damnedest thing about ALL of those alerts is the instant feeling of “I’ve got to Do Something!” followed by the realization that you can do nothing at all, except maybe hide…


Comment from BJM
Time: April 5, 2023, 6:58 pm

This reminds me of the late 70’s and early 80’s when the movies “Three Mile Island”, “Testament”, and “The Day After” created a general concern. The Gubmint decided that cities must prepare and submit a Nuclear Evacuation plan.

The SF Board of Supes had a good laugh and refused to waste time and money as there wouldn’t be anyone left to evacuate. The SF Bay Area had the West Coast nuclear sub fleet base, a nuclear weapon depot, a carrier base, the Blue Cube, Silicon Valley, and Lawrence Livermore Labs.

We never gave the threat a second thought cos pretty much everyone knew what living in a saturated target zone meant after “On the Beach” nailed it.

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