(Eds: Repeating after changing slug)By Lalit K JhaWashington, Jan 14 (PTI) A ballistic missile warningsystem alert in Hawaii went off erroneously today creatingpanic among the islanders, even as the officials dubbed it a"false alarm".
At around 8.07 am local Hawaii time, an emergency alertwas sent to all cell phones in caps. "Ballistic missile threatinbounds to Hawaii. Seek immediate shelter. This is not adrill."About 10 minutes later, Hawaii Emergency ManagementAgency tweeted that there was no such threat. "No missilethreat to Hawaii," it said. The second emergency alert wentout at 8:45 am.
"There is no missile threat or danger to the State ofHawaii. Repeat. False Alarm," it said.
US Pacific Command in a separate statement said itdetected no ballistic missile threat to Hawaii. "Earliermessage was sent in error, it said.
White House Deputy Press Secretary Lindsay Walters saidPresident Donald Trump has been briefed on the state ofHawaii's emergency management exercise. "It was purely a stateexercise," she said.
Democratic Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard said the people ofHawaii "just got a sense of the stark reality of what anuclear strike on Hawaii would be".
Cell phones all across Hawaii got a message saying aballistic missile is incoming, take shelter, she added.
"Over a million of Hawaii's people were faced with theimmediate reality of having 15 minutes to find a place to"take shelter," wondering where do I go? What shelter is goingto protect me & my family from a nuclear bomb? But there'snowhere to go, nowhere to hide," she said in a series oflengthy tweets.
"Everyone in America needs to understand that if you hadto go through this, you would be as angry as I am -- I havebeen talking about the seriousness of this threat for years,"Gabbard said.
The Congresswoman from Hawaii, Gabbard accused Trump of"posturing" and not taking nuclear threats from North Koreaseriously and urged to begin direct talks with Pyongyangwithout preconditions.
"Donald Trump is taking too long. Now is not the time forposturing. He must take this threat seriously and begin directtalks with North Korea, without preconditions, to de-escalateand denuclearise the Korean peninsula. There is no time towaste," Gabbard said.
"The people of Hawaii should never have had to go throughthis. The people of America should not be faced with thisthreat right now. We need peace -- not political bickering. Wehave to talk to North Korea and find a peaceful path to getrid of this nuclear threat," she said. PTI LKJ CKUZM.
This is unedited, unformatted feed from the Press Trust of India wire.