Fake Radio Broadcast in Michigan About Chemical Spills and Zombies Has People Call 911
46 replies, posted
[URL]http://www.mlive.com/news/grand-rapids/index.ssf/2013/11/fake_traverse_city_radio_broad.html#incart_river_default[/URL]
[quote=]TRAVERSE CITY, MI -- A fake Halloween radio broadcast about a train chemical spill leading to zombie-like behavior fooled some people calling 911 in Grand Traverse County.[/quote]
[quote=]The Halloween evening broadcast, staged by WGFM disc jockeys, passed news about a purported government email about a train leaking chemicals from Ludington to the Detroit area and that people should avoid getting close to the tracks.
Later in the 23-minute broadcast, they talk about a "bath-salt style attack" in Cadillac and a similar attack in downtown Traverse City with "blood everywhere."
The broadcast ends with the sound of breaking glass at the Cheboygan station, some screams and the song "The End of The World as We Know It" by R.E.M. playing afterward.
Torrey said dispatchers tried calling the radio station during the broadcast after they had received some 911 calls. Dispatchers could not reach anyone, so they posted a message on the [URL="https://www.facebook.com/GrandTraverse911/posts/743912562291072#!/GrandTraverse911?hc_location=timeline"]911 system's web page[/URL].
It said the following:
"FALSE INFORMATION ALERT: Some concerned citizens have called us stating that a local radio station is broadcasting info on a train derailment that is causing a Hazmat issue in the Traverse City area. There is NO train derailment (seriously), and we believe this is their version of some Halloween fun. Hope this clears things up! In the mean time, we are out searching for the Dogman. Happy Halloween!"[/quote]
Link to recording - [URL]https://soundcloud.com/hungoversmitty/rock-105-dudes-and-the-real[/URL]
Playing on people's credulity just got amped up a couple of notches. Yet how credulous would you have to be to believe that sort of outlandish announcement?
DJs really should know by now that this will cause people to panic.
Imagine if this was real. That would cause heck of a stir!
EDIT 1: If this was announced on a different date.
snip
[IMG]http://i.imgur.com/zwV33fF.jpg[/IMG]
they heard of zombies and their first instinct is to call 911?
if this was a real zombie apocalypse they would be dead
hah, amateurs. everybody knows 911 doesn't work during a zombie apocalypse.
[QUOTE=Cmx;42830959]DJs really should know by now that this will cause people to panic.[/QUOTE]
No fun allowed I guess.
It is amusing to know that the War of the Worlds prank never goes out of style.
I did training at my community radio station, at least in Canada you need to say once every 15 minutes that it's a radio play/joke or the CRTC will find you.
It's war of the worlds all over again
Should've used this for more immersion
[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rF4BCMs-8BE[/media]
[QUOTE=Flarey;42831060]they heard of zombies and their first instinct is to call 911?
if this was a real zombie apocalypse they would be dead[/QUOTE]
Send more cops...
Reminds me of the 2012 "Mayan Apocalypse" hype. On the day the world was "supposed" to end, I had to work. To pass the time, I started posting on Facebook, as if the apocalypse had started. A customer had supposedly bitten my manager, who soon got cold sweats. . .he "died," and then turned, and started attacking us. . .we killed him with a fire extinguisher to the head, and barracaded the restaurant.
I continued to "update" through the night. We eventually made it to the roof. . .a coworker showed up with guns, and we made our way to a nearby gas station. One of my coworkers died while using a gas pump as a flamethrower. I ended up "dying" after sacrificing one of my friends, so I could escape.
It was fun, and I even got my coworkers to join in on their Facebook pages. The story ended up getting pretty detailed.
Fun, right?
Cue dozens of my contacts (most of whom were otherwise intelligent people) messaging me, asking if I was okay, and completely flipping the fuck out. My ex-wife even texted me to see if I was okay.
Never underestimate your average person's ability to be dumb enough to believe in zombies.
I've always wanted to set up a fake Number Station within like a city area and have the local radio operators freak out as I'll change the numbers every week.
That was pretty fun to listen to although the ending was kinda badly acted
We had a similar situation with a car advertise just south of Traverse City in Ludington. It started out as "warning, there has been a zombie outbreak in mason county"
People flipped their shit but it didn't make the news unfortunately.
Why would anyone ever think that could ever happen?
[QUOTE=Sai;42831912]Why would anyone ever think that could ever happen?[/QUOTE]
You've obviously never been to Michigan.
I don't understand how people can be fooled by radio broadcasts but fuck, that's golden.
My town's(population >1000, mind you) radio plays the War of the Worlds radio hoax every year, and there's always one person who loses their fucking mind
[QUOTE=OogalaBoogal;42831267]I did training at my community radio station, at least in Canada you need to say once every 15 minutes that it's a radio play/joke or the CRTC will find you.[/QUOTE]
I can see it now, you are two seconds late delivering the notice as the bit you're performing is pretty damn good.
Suddenly CRTC burst through the windows in full tactical gear with a overly large pair of scissors and cut your microphone cabling. And just like that, they are gone again.
[QUOTE=Omali;42831146]It is amusing to know that the War of the Worlds prank never goes out of style.[/QUOTE]
Apparently that never really happened (to the extent spoken of) and it was just the Newspaper companies trying to discredit radio as a source of news.
[QUOTE]Editorialists chastised the radio industry for allowing this to happen. This response may have reflected newspaper publishers' fears that radio, to which they had lost some of the advertising revenue that was scarce enough during the Great Depression, would render them obsolete. In The War of the Worlds, they saw an opportunity to cast aspersions on the newer medium. "The nation as a whole continues to face the danger of incomplete, misunderstood news over a medium which has yet to prove," wrote Editor & Publisher, the newspaper industry's trade journal, "that it is competent to perform the news job."[/QUOTE]
[url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_War_of_the_Worlds_(radio_drama)[/url]
[QUOTE=booster;42831420]Should've used this for more immersion
[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rF4BCMs-8BE[/media][/QUOTE]
There's something so eerie about this
My question is, what caused people to call 911?
In a real emergency wouldn't the cops already know about the situation before the news got around to a radio station?
[QUOTE=fruxodaily;42832336]There's something so eerie about this[/QUOTE]It's that damn beeping. It always scares the fuck out of me when it comes on.
[QUOTE=booster;42831420]Should've used this for more immersion
[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rF4BCMs-8BE[/media][/QUOTE]
Here ye be
[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=niMb-hR6gZ0[/media]
[editline]11th November 2013[/editline]
[QUOTE=Jad Hinto;42832542]It's that damn beeping. It always scares the fuck out of me when it comes on.[/QUOTE]
Fun fact: that beeping contains data. The first three beeps are SAME (Specific Area Message Encoding) headers, which is repeated three times for redundancy, since the readers that send the message out to the public doesn't have error detection systems, followed by the shrill attention signal. The header is basically a binary signal with the origination of message, [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Specific_Area_Message_Encoding#Event_codes[/url]event code,[/url] locations affected, time until the message is ended (minimum of 15 minutes), exact date of issue in UTC, and a callsign.
I don't know how or why I know this, but I do.
[QUOTE=Dacheet;42832707]
[editline]11th November 2013[/editline]
Fun fact: that beeping contains data. The first three beeps are SAME (Specific Area Message Encoding) headers, which is repeated three times for redundancy, since the readers that send the message out to the public doesn't have error detection systems, followed by the shrill attention signal. The header is basically a binary signal with the origination of message, [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Specific_Area_Message_Encoding#Event_codes[/url]event code,[/url] locations affected, time until the message is ended (minimum of 15 minutes), exact date of issue in UTC, and a callsign.
I don't know how or why I know this, but I do.[/QUOTE]Huh, I'll be damned. Doesn't make it any less ominous, but still pretty neat.
[QUOTE=fruxodaily;42832336]There's something so eerie about this[/QUOTE]
Yeah Gobible's scare the shit out of me too.
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