4 Minutes Before Destruction

"Attack warning RED!" - these are words familiar to anyone who has seen the 1984 film Threads. It's heard in a makeshift government bunker under a town hall, followed by the panic of various unprepared officials, and then the thunder of a nuclear explosion on the surface. The sentence "Attack warning RED!" to signify incoming nuclear warheads is not an invention made by the writers, though. It was a real announcement of the Handel warning system, used in Britain from 1962 to 1992.

Handel was part of Britain's 4-minute warning system, which was active during the cold war. Nuclear missiles could be detected approximately 4 minutes before they hit Britain; hence the name. It was operated by the United Kingdom Warning and Monitoring Organisaiton (UKWMO). Once an attack was detected, the UKWMO activate sirens and would notify the BBC, who would notify the general population via TV and radio.

Were the cold war to get close to a nuclear exchange, a public information campaign called Protect and Survive would be spread. It included leaflets, TV and radio broadcasts, and information in newspaper ad spaces. It was designed to teach the general population about how to prepare for a nuclear attack, and how to survive in the aftermath. It included information such as the effects of a nuclear bomb, how to build a makeshift fallout shelter, how long to wait before coming out of the shelter, and what to do with any corpses in your shelter.