Old news making new rounds.
According to reports from early January of last year, “thousands of signs calling out locations of fallout shelters” were still posted across NYC’s five boroughs and the city had began the process of removing them.
“They’re relics from another era. Faded fallout shelter signs put up more than 50 years ago during the height of the Cold War, when Americans were instructed and even drilled on what to do in case of a nuclear attack.”
Jeff Schlegelmilch, a “disaster preparation expert,” said he believed “it was a good idea,” saying “the signs are so outdated they are misleading.”
The shelters were established and existed under the direction of the Office of Civil Defense, which no longer exists.
Schlegelmilch says he thinks nuclear war is extremely unlikely but the shelter signs give New Yorkers a false sense of comfort they would have a place to go.
He says building owners whose properties have the old shelter signs should follow the education department’s lead in removing them.
“What could happen is that you end up in the shadow of a mushroom cloud, running up to a building and the doors are locked and the shelter has not been in any sort of functional capacity for many decades,” Schlegelmilch said.
NY 1
Unfortunately, reports of the removal of the old signs came amid the time right when “Trump tweeted that he has a nuclear button that is bigger and more powerful than that of the North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.”
According to Office of Emergency Management, in case of a nuclear attack, you should “get inside the nearest building, stay inside and stay tuned for alerts.”