FILE PHOTO: Soccer Football - Scottish Premiership - Celtic v Motherwell - Celtic Park, Glasgow, Scotland, Britain - May 14, 2022 Celtic's Kyogo Furuhashi celebrates scoring their first goal Action Images via Reuters/Molly Darlington/File Photo
On 13 January 2018, things were tense on Hawaii. The reason for the tension was that Donald Trump was President and relations with North Korea were fraught to say the very least. As the Pacific fleet is based at Pearl Harbour, the people who lived there knew that if the shooting started that they were likely to be amongst the first targets.
At 08:07am, Hawaiians mobile phones began to beep with the same message, from the state emergency alert system.
This is what it said; “BALLISTIC MISSILE THREAT INBOUND TO HAWAII. SEEK IMMEDIATE SHELTER. THIS IS NOT A DRILL.”
This. Is. Not. A. Drill.
Those five words are scarier than everything that precedes them.
And so the people who lived there had every reason to believe that within a short space of time – 25 minutes or so – their homes, workplaces and Hell, their very lives, would be snuffed out.
Local TV stations, who were plugged into the same alert system, interrupted their coverage and both visual and audio warnings were relayed to the viewers. Their message was more detailed and therefore even more alarming.
“The U.S. Pacific Command has detected a missile threat to Hawaii. A missile may impact on land or sea within minutes. THIS IS NOT A DRILL. If you are indoors, stay indoors. If you are outdoors, seek immediate shelter in a building. Remain indoors well away from windows. If you are driving, pull safely to the side of the road and seek shelter in a building or lay on the floor. We will announce when the threat has ended. THIS IS NOT A DRILL. Take immediate action measures.”
For some people, the “crisis” lasted a mere three minutes.
The military knew immediately that it was a false alarm, and so did those in the civilian chain of command. By 8.10am a message to that effect was supposed to be sent out. In fact, it wasn’t.
The state governor had posted by 8.20 on Facebook and on Twitter that the alert wasn’t real … but the actual official “all clear” message from the agency responsible for sending out the message didn’t start beeping on people’s phones until 8.45.
For 38 minutes, almost every ordinary citizen on Hawaii thought they were under attack and that Armageddon was either in progress or on its way.
The whole thing was later found to have been the result of “human error.”
A single solitary guy in the agency responsible for alerting the citizens sent out the wrong message and a series of errors followed in relation to getting out the real one.
It’s a great story, and the reason I find it particularly interesting is that the UK is finally getting its own version of that system, and the first “test” for everyone using a 4G or 5G phone will go “live” at 3pm on 23 April. Your mobile will vibrate and emit a siren sound. The message will announce that it is a test. Unless someone screws up.
It’s sort of a shame that the test isn’t coming a week later, when we’re at Hampden.
Because if we’ve already won tomorrow’s game and take the lead in that one, their club won’t need an emergency alert system to know they have big problems. Their own fans will make clear their dissatisfaction in a way that leaves no room for error.
Still, if that test was taking place on 30 April, those alerts would go off right in the middle of the second half. It’s possible that by that point some of their fans might welcome a rain of nuclear fire and their board might very well be in full on crisis mode.
The press this week was, as ever, filled with their players making big bold predictions about how we’ve not seen the “real” them yet and how this weekend at Parkhead we would. I think we did. It wasn’t very impressive, was it?
You can see the outlines of their descent to chaos starting to form already.
As a result of today, that whole club is already on high alert.
Fear and loathing run rampant through the halls.
One man has already headed for the bunker; Douglas Park will be the most relieved man connected to the whole mess. Yesterday’s chairman, which means that today and its aftermath are a problem for somebody else.
Once those alarms start to blare, The Mooch will find himself literally standing at Ground Zero. He has over-promised. If he also under delivers he will start next season with one foot already in the grave.
Get off to a bad start and his own final countdown will be well underway.
We’ve seen how Ibrox treats failed managers … even ones who reach European finals.
That’s not a nice place to be, any more than Honolulu would have been had there really been a missile, or missiles, heading towards the place. I wonder how he will handle the pressure. I think it more than possible that they’ve lose more games in the league before the campaign ends, and that of course will only add to the impression that things are slipping.
But at Hampden … man, that’s going to be his do-or-die afternoon.
This was their alert warning. They have two weeks to sort themselves out, and they are going into that game with nothing but what they have right now … which means they’re already on the back foot.
Lose that one and there won’t be any more time to run. All that’ll be left is to wait for the brilliant flash of light, and all the destruction that comes afterwards.
If they can’t beat us on a must win game and they think that they can turn up in a semi final with all guns blazing I guarantee you celtic will put 5 by them.
Bring it on. HH
bbc scotland devoting their show to baby huns implosion. Luvin their attitude. HH
The target for Ange and his celtic team was to improve upon last season.
So with 8 games left, which should become 9 that mission has already been achieved.
So this bollocks of late that the scum are closing the gap towards us, is what it remains bollocks as the gap has actually grown and stands to become even greater still.
We will go into the semi with far less expectations upon us as the mindset will be about achieving and finalising the success this team deserves.
Believe we seen the best of what the scum truly have to offer which isn’t much either.
So looking forward to the semi now as this team is very worthy of claiming a treble and can’t see a bunch of imposters and bullshitters stopping us either
We didn’t play well, at home in front of 60K supporters.
We got lucky today.
But they still couldn’t beat us!
The bonus from today is that we got a reminder not to get complacent.
We have to get back on our game for the SC semi.
Ange will get it sorted.
Today we were the better side, but it was a close game, but we could have lost on another day.
The VAR check on Morelos goal went our way—had that been the other end we would have been screaming conspiracy.
So yes we were better but it was pretty close.
The semi final will be another tough close fought contest. VAR may not go our way that day and we did lose last year so lets focus on us. Lets hope Hatate is back as he makes a big difference to our side. They also missed Goldson for sure especially as CB errors gave us 2 goals.
LEts keep the focus, the treble so close now.
i must admit…..
i have to laugh at people already predicting a walkover in next match v huns…..
some people really only see thru green tinted glasses…..unreal.
celtic were awful for majot parts of the game today….i would have had mooy off after 15mins…and o’reilly….jeez…our passing was atrocious…was a disgrace we let them back into game….
but were we bad because of huns high press/tactics or did we just have an off day ?…i can’t make my mind up…i think we were lucky today…nothing wrong with morelos “goal”….huns deserved something from game…regardless of whether we like to admit it or not…the huns are making more of a match of it against us since beale arrived…
but on the flip side…the huns STILL couldn’t beat us, as bad as we were…so there is that….
next season is gonna be v v interesting….
HH
O’Reilly is bang average at best, cant tackle, slow mentally and physically, one paced. Mooy looked like a slug pulling a tractor. Without Reo’s drive we are not the same side. Missed Abada whether starting or off the bench. The high press did cause problems, we have to learn to pass through it from the back but the wide men and midfielders didn’t help CCV and the boys.
In England today arrests over discriminatory chanting, quite rightly. Are the laws on such in Scotland somehow different???
Didnae play well and we still beat them, that says somethin. Tho that’s the worst passin ah’ve seen from this team so far. Definitely missed Hetate’s craft in the mid. Need tae tidy it up for the semi final. Anyway, league’s won, HH.
Right so, ’twas a typical derby but we’re 12 points clear and the title is now secured. Be happy guys. We didn’t play scintillating and Ange’s judgement was a bit awry. Should’ve started Iwata, Mooy was unfit. They had one shot on target 1st half and scored. Both Johnston/Morelos were at the tugging prior to the ball arriving, when it did it was an obvious push right in front of the ref. Ali was shirt pulling later too he needs to stop that. The Jota one was bollocks, or just above the groin. Ok they did have some half chances 2nd half, Oh and Berna had chances to run on and shoot too and chose not to weirdly.
I hope Ange sees we were better with Iwata. His time is now and with Reo back as well for the semi, in place of an off the boil O’Riley I think we’ll have much more energy. HH
Mooy had a nightmare, should have been sub’d at half time. Lack of composure generally was a worry. McGregor may be a good ambassador and club captain but on the field he disappears when the pressure is on. Iwata has to start.
The Phantom goal that was disollowrd was a foul! Everyone knows in football at any level defenders always get benifits of that situation and he did push him!! I wish they gave them it tho as now all we going here is the whining !! Much like the league cup final of 2019!! It’s like they crave our valadation and relevance and they do we played for 33minuyes with 10 men in that game a fact that’s never mentioned! Ever when the BBC hun media talk of it and now this foul which is a foul!! Is going be there consolation boobi prize!! It’s what kosersfo in life! Also then never having one decision ever go against them since var has made these huns even more entitled! Haha CELTIC! Do us all a favour turn up on 30th play Iwata , hatte and Calmac one forward for that game mooy and O’Reilly far to wasteful and mooy being out for few weeks affected him big time today. Anyway turn up and totally smash this new club. I worry for our fans tonight tho as those rancid bastards will attacj anyone in green ,well if in majority it’s the hun way, Digusting the authorises cooked the hate crime assaults but we know why lost all data apparently what a place Brigadoon is. Be safe fellow Celts another TREBLE incoming enjoy THE CELTCIBRATION!
Should Celtic beat Rangers in the semi-final and they should. Looking at yesterday’s game it wasn’t the usual confident Celtic with passes going astray for long parts of the game and Rangers couldn’t capitalise. The excuses from Beale came flooding and it was penalty, penalty, penalty. For some reason their under the impression that Jota handled the ball prior to Furuhashi getting his second goal. Even Kris Boyd said quote…. I don’t know what their looking at. Also the Morelos shirt pulling in the second half by Johnstone is another their bitching about and of course the disallowed Morelos goal. The bottom line is these guys are delusional, they have had so many penalties they think they should be awarded the mandatory penalty every week. Remember this is a team that has a fullback with a 100 goals and this is also a team that’s had zero penalties against. The problem for the semi-final is Beale and company are already trying to apply pressure on their mates (SFA) to get any edge they can on us. I wouldn’t bet against them getting a controversial penalty against us, just so there’s no bad feeling between mates.
What on earth happened to Mooy yesterday? He’s been great but yesterday he couldn’t find a Celtic shirt for toffee. When he got booked we were in Nir Bitton territory. He was so off the pace be was going to get dispossessed and then lunge in and get sent off and I wouldn’t have fancied us yesterday if it had gone down to ten men. Luckily Ange brought on Iwata at just the right time and he settled it down.
Don’t want to be too hard on Mooy, it was one game, but maybe Iwata deserves more game time now.
An odd, disjointed display, it was lion spirit and chasing lost causes that won the day. Johnston magnificent, Jota’s goal awesome, cushioned touch with the right and steered in with the left, in a single stride. What a player we have there.