Russia conducted a nationwide test of its emergency public warning systems on Wednesday, setting off sirens and disrupting broadcasts as part of a routine check amid heightened tensions due to the ongoing war in Ukraine, NBC News reported.

Sirens wailed and television and radio broadcasts were interrupted in a twice-yearly initiative amid the war in Ukraine.

At around 10.30 a.m. in most of Russia's 11 time zones, sirens sounded for a minute, with loudspeakers broadcasting an "Attention everyone!" call, the emergency ministry said on the Telegram messaging app prior to the test.

The purpose of the exercise was to check the warning systems and the readiness of those responsible for launching them and to raise public awareness, the ministry said, adding ahead of the test, "Don't panic — everything is according to a plan."

The frequency of rehearsals was doubled from last year, following the first event held in 2020.

The history of emergency warning systems in Russia dates back to the Soviet era. The country began developing early warning systems in the 1960s, with the first two generations of radars being adapted from space surveillance and anti-satellite technologies. However, these systems have not always operated without error.

In 1983, a malfunction in the Soviet Union's early warning system, known as Oko, nearly triggered a nuclear crisis. The system mistakenly detected an incoming nuclear missile, but a rare alignment of sunlight and satellites caused the false alarm.

An officer who had worked on the system quickly reset it, preventing what could have been a catastrophic nuclear exchange.

The test in Russia follows a similar nationwide emergency alert drill conducted in the United States in October 2023. Russia and the U.S. remain vigilant in maintaining and testing their emergency alert systems, particularly in light of ongoing geopolitical tensions and the potential risks of miscommunication or system failures.

Information from Reuters was used in this report.

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