Japan sends false alert on missile attack - just days after Hawaii made the same mistake
Japanese public broadcaster NHK issued a false alarm about a North Korean missile launch on Tuesday, just days after a similar gaffe caused panic in Hawaii, but managed to correct the error within minutes.
It was not immediately clear what triggered the mistake and an NHK spokesman said they were still checking what had happened.
The alert, sent out at 6.55pm local time, said: "North Korea appears to have launched a missile ... The government urges people to take shelter inside buildings or underground."
The same alert was sent to mobile phone users of NHK's online news distribution service.
Five minutes later, the broadcaster put out another message correcting itself.
Regional tensions soared in September 2017 after North Korea conducted its sixth and largest nuclear test.
Two months later North Korean authorities said they had successfully tested a new type of intercontinental ballistic missile that could reach the US mainland.
There were no immediate reports of major panic or significant disruption following the Japanese report.
Human error and a lack of fail-safe measures during a civil defence warning drill led to the false missile alert that caused panic across Hawaii, a state emergency management agency spokesman said.
Elaborating on the origins of Saturday's false alarm, which went uncorrected for nearly 40 minutes, spokesman Richard Rapoza said the employee who mistakenly sent the missile alert had been "temporarily reassigned" to other duties.
