Emergency response worker temporarily reassigned after false Hawaii missile alert

The employee who mistakenly triggered the alarm that there was an inbound missile heading towards Hawaii has been temporarily reassigned, NBC News reported Monday.

“All we will say is that the individual has been temporarily reassigned within our Emergency Operations Center pending the outcome of our internal investigation,” Richard Rapoza, spokesman for the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency, told the news outlet. {mosads}

Rapoza added that the worker is “currently in a role that does not provide access to the warning system.”

Hawaii Gov. David Ige (D) told CNN over the weekend that “an employee pushed the wrong button,” which sent a false alarm to over one million cellphones ordering people on the islands to “seek immediate shelter” from the incoming attack.

The alert, which sent Hawaii into a state of panic, comes amid growing concerns about North Korea’s nuclear weapon capabilities.

Late last year, Hawaii reinstated its Cold War-era nuclear warning system amid heightened tensions between Washington and Pyongyang over North Korea’s repeated weapons tests.

Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) on Sunday told CNN President Trump should hold talks with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un to “work out the differences so that we can build a pathway towards denuclearization, to remove this threat.”

“It’s not just the president making a decision to launch a nuclear weapon. It’s these kinds of mistakes that we have seen happen in the past that bring us to this brink of nuclear war that could be unintentional,” she added.

The Federal Communications Commission is also looking into the mishap, NBC reported.