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DON’T PANIC!!!
 

[Closed] DON’T PANIC!!!

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Went off on, and could be dismissed from, my watch. That’s quite neat.


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 4:19 pm
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Mine didn't go off, I'd allowed extreme alerts, but not severe alerts, not sure what the criteria is between severe and extreme.

But then I realised I'd disabled location sharing elsewhere in the options, so I guess thats why.


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 4:24 pm
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3 mobiles in the house, all on different networks.

None went off.

I is disappointed 😂


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 4:25 pm
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I forgot all about it and picked up my phone at 21 minutes past three and it went off. I fully support the actions of my government overlords.


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 4:26 pm
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Mine didn’t go off, I’d allowed extreme alerts, but not severe alerts, not sure what the criteria is between severe and extreme.

Aye, I wondered that whilst i was turning them off. Which one's best? Or worst.


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 4:32 pm
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Knew it was coming but (story of my life) came early at 2:59 though so still had a small heart attack....🤣


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 4:35 pm
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Was on the Nottingham ring road when it went off, near QMC. Huge pile ups as vehicles swerved all over the road, a bus of school kids plummeted off Clifton Bridge onto the Trent, and planes bound foe East Mids airport fell out the sky.


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 4:40 pm
blokeuptheroad, Del, matt_outandabout and 1 people reacted
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Nothing, I'm clearly off the grid 😎


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 4:43 pm
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Didn't turn it off, didn't get it. I'd call that a world-beating success.


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 4:47 pm
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Sat in a cafe, and the table by table turn taking was hilarious over a 5 minute period...


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 4:53 pm
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About 3 phones plus mine went off in the pub. Resulting in one scared dog and a spilt pint


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 5:01 pm
mattyfez and jp-t853 reacted
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At my parent's house and it took a good 15 minutes for the 5 phones there to eventually make the noise. Strangely they all made different noises, no voices though. The message was in Welsh too so completely pointless as I can't read it. The English version was just visible starting below the Welsh text but as soon as I tapped the message it disappeared so no way to read it 🤣


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 5:02 pm
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Apparently three network has been patchy. Ours worked though, my wife was a minute or two ahead of mine.


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 5:24 pm
 Kuco
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Both phones went off for me, my own on EE and work on Vodaphone. About a 30-second gap between the two going off.


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 5:28 pm
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Nothing here either. I guess we're amongst the minions that don't need to know of the impending apocalypse.


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 5:35 pm
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And this is why we test…


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 5:42 pm
ads678, thepurist, kelvin and 7 people reacted
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Apparently three network has been patchy.

More info here. Assume Smarty would have the same issue.

David Wheatley on Twitter


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 5:42 pm
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Out with the kids. Both our phones went off, hot ok and carried on. Got home and picked up my work phone. Hit ok and got on with life.


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 5:45 pm
kelvin and ernielynch reacted
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You'd think they'd have tested it before... er... oh.


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 5:46 pm
kelvin and Del reacted
 Drac
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Barely woke me from my night shift sleep, it stopped before i even picked my phone up.


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 5:50 pm
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Why the America voice?

Yup, a BBC Shipping Forecast type voice would have been more warmly reassuring imo.

It seems bizarre to use someone with a very strong American accent.


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 5:56 pm
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@mattyfez
The alert that went out was a severe one. Extreme is worse.

There is an option on my phone to tell the phone to dictate the alert, presumably that's why some phones talked


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 5:57 pm
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It seems bizarre to use someone with a very strong American accent.

As above, It's still in testing, the accent is just probably whatever was to hand and copywrite free.

Maybe we will get the soothing voice of Joanna Lumlemy in the final version, ...or maybe even options... for example Arnie shouting "get to da choppa!"


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 5:59 pm
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The alert that went out was a severe one. Extreme is worse.

There is an option on my phone to tell the phone to dictate the alert, presumably that’s why some phones talked

Thanks, yeah I'd assumed 'extreme' was the highest level... and also figured out (I think) I'd nerfed the alerts via having location access disabled at a lower level in the android OS.

I'm also on 3 network, but the phone would have been on home WiFi at the time, so wheather that had any bearing on me not getting the alert, I dunno..


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 6:11 pm
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About a 30-second gap between the two going off.

I was with a group of ramblers and all the phones that went off went off at exactly the same time. Which was a couple of minutes before 3 o'clock.


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 6:17 pm
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and also figured out (I think) I’d nerfed the alerts via having location access disabled at a lower level in the android OS.

they don’t need location access for the phone. Each cell tower is supposed to send it to all devices connected to it.


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 6:58 pm
kelvin reacted
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they don’t need location access for the phone. Each cell tower is supposed to send it to all devices connected to it.

Hmm interesting...

Maybe because I'm on 3 network then, I've read some devices on 3 didn't get the alert.
That said I'm sure as hell I disabled severe alerts but allowed critical alerts a few days ago, but when I didn't get any alert, I checked my settings and teh whole emergency alert thing was greyed out for want of a better phrase... both severe and critical.... its now 'on' again but I guess I missed the window to actually get an alert.


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 7:05 pm
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I was dropping daughter at Uni and then we went to Tesco's to get some stuff while I had the car to help carry it.

Seems to me like pretty much everyone got the alert pretty much on 1500, maybe a minute early. No-one panicked or had their civil liberties infringed as far as I could tell.


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 7:17 pm
kelvin reacted
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You couldn't make this up:

Last weekend I visited my very elderly parents and finally persuaded them to have my old but pretty powerful and high quality bluetooth speaker so the could listen to R3 concerts from my mums phone on iplayer......yes you guessed it - deep in the middle of the Pastoral symphony and whammo its the end of the world as we know it!!!

Not sure they will ever recover*

*this is not true - a swift sherry and all is well


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 7:45 pm
kelvin and mattyfez reacted
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We got ours a few minutes late, then as we crossed the Severn Bridge an hour and a half lster, we got the Welsh version (any Welsh speakers on here have it read out by their phones? I don't speak Welsh but have learned it in school and can pronounce words, but to my ear it sound completely disjointed..any Welsh speakers comment?)


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 7:48 pm
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I'm on Three, alerts all switched on but nothing on my phone.


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 7:50 pm
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Seems an appropriate place to drop https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-6534045 9">this


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 8:57 pm
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I’m confused. I didn’t get the alert (three) but the wife did, but what’s this about a voice? We only got the alerting tones.


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 9:10 pm
mc86 reacted
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Image


 
Posted : 23/04/2023 11:10 pm
mashr reacted
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Did anyone else get more than one alert? I received three. 2.59, 3.01 and 3.02. Wife on same network, same phone and in same room as me only got one.

I think it’s a great idea and am fascinated that people manage to get upset by it.


 
Posted : 24/04/2023 12:06 am
kelvin reacted
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You Three types - bearing in mind next to sod all coverage in the sticks, I'm guessing you'll mostly city based. So come the armageddon, you are all basically bolloxed in the first wave of missile strikes regardless of a wee notice on your phone. So no real biggie.

Maybe they could replace the sirens with some soothing mindfulness and we can all be annoalated at peace with whole idea rather than sharting ourselves.


 
Posted : 24/04/2023 12:18 am
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I’d forgotten the alert, and the time, so it made me start for a second, but that’s all. Dunno why so many people are having a fit of the vapours about it, it’s a one-off national trial for something that’s mostly going to be for local extreme events, like flooding, weather events, etc.


 
Posted : 24/04/2023 12:31 am
kelvin reacted
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I got mine (Talkmobile).

Wife didn't get either of hers (Talkmobile and 3 on a dual sim).

Daughter didn't get hers (3).

Looks like more work needing to be done.

As for not needing it, I presume nobody saying that lives near any potentially nasty infrastructure.


 
Posted : 24/04/2023 12:49 am
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Looks like more work needing to be done.

Generally what the point of testing is.

If they hadn't done this, then there was some sort of actual disaster and the warning system didn't work, the tinfoil-hat brigade would obvs be going "well, it hasn't been tested properly!"


 
Posted : 24/04/2023 1:49 am
theotherjonv, Bunnyhop, thepurist and 1 people reacted
 csb
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Wife turned her work phone on at 11pm and it went off like a klaxon. Is it meant to issue tge alert 8 hours after the event?


 
Posted : 24/04/2023 1:57 am
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the could listen to R3 concerts from my mums phone on iplayer……yes you guessed it – deep in the middle of the Pastoral symphony and whammo its the end of the world as we know it!!!

Wow I never thought Radio 3 would try a Beethoven/REM mashup.


 
Posted : 24/04/2023 8:44 am
leffeboy and sc-xc reacted
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I think the alerts should be done by Edward James Olmos.


 
Posted : 24/04/2023 8:55 am
oldnpastit reacted
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Mine didn't go off, hubby's did.


 
Posted : 24/04/2023 10:16 am
 poly
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Gobochul, turning off an alert system you never expect to get used sounds unnecessarily paranoid.

We do get large flooding events and weather patterns are likely to be more extreme.  We do get wildfires which reach populations.  We do get terrorist incidents.  We have had reservoirs at risk of breaching the dam.  We do get major gas pipe ruptures.  We do find unexploded ordinance.  We do have (aging) nuclear power stations.  We do have oil refineries and chemical plants.  Our relationship with Russia is the worst it has been for decades.  Viruses remain a threat.

Given that many of those evacuations involve police/fire going door to door to tell people to leave it seems we don’t rely on people listening to traditional media quickly enough.

as someone who lives out of ear shot of the gas alarms at the local chemical factories but if the wind is blowing the right way very much in the fall our zone I welcome it.  Given other people I know who are in the audible alarm area I would likely hear quickly if there was cause for concern but if you were visiting the area I wonder if you would have the same network?

even if you turned it back on after the test I don’t understand what silencing it achieved - 5 seconds of peace?  But no idea if it worked on your phone, and no idea what the sound or screen look like on your phone so slightly increased confusion if it is needed OR increased risk of being scammed by some “fake alert”.


 
Posted : 24/04/2023 10:24 am
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Was quite the cacophony walking around Costco...


 
Posted : 24/04/2023 10:25 am
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