

Happy Petrov day - omegant
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanislav_Petrov

======
VMG
I find it fascinating and terrifying that on the one hand, these events were
"close calls", on the other hand, considering that we can celebrate this event
today, they were inevitable.

Logically speaking, we always must live in a world where past existential
threats to humanity were avoided (including super-volcanoes, asteroids), but
that says nothing about the possibility of future existential threats wiping
out humanity.

~~~
jerf
One of my favorite SCPs: [http://www.scp-wiki.net/scp-988](http://www.scp-
wiki.net/scp-988)

Spoiler (including why it's related to your post) since I think it's easy to
miss what this is: Vg'f n obk gung, jura bcrarq, qrfgeblf gur havirefr. Fvapr
nccneragyl guvf obk yvirf va n znal-jbeyqf havirefr, vg'f onfvpnyyl n
havirefr-fpnyr Dhnaghz Fhvpvqr qrivpr.

[http://www.rot13.com/index.php](http://www.rot13.com/index.php) , for your
convenience.

~~~
mahyarm
How did you come to that conclusion? It could similarly be a joke out of a
ringworld novel too.

~~~
jerf
The big clue is in the last paragraph.

And yes, I'm extrapolating a bit, but given the rest of the SCP-universe
(inasmuch as there is a such a thing), it's a pretty reasonable conclusion. If
it's wrong to you, well, it's right to me, Hail Fanon, All Hail Discordia.

------
midko
FYI, if you call it Petrov day, your eastern european orthodox friends (such
as Bulgarians and Russians) will tell you you are 3 months late. "Petrovden"
(den == day) is the shorthand name of the St Peter's and Paul's day on the
29th June, it is a nameday of everyone called Peter, Paul and their
variations, and it is very well recognized and celebrated.

~~~
huhtenberg
Never heard of it, leave alone seeing anyone celebrating it.

Though I did hear about the "Saint Mother Mary of Egypt" day which was about
every second Friday if you were to believe a heavy-drinking madam two floors
down from where we lived.

~~~
midko
[https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%9F%D0%B5%D1%82%D1%80%D0%BE...](https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%9F%D0%B5%D1%82%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%B2_%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BD%D1%8C)

~~~
eps
The "Spring farewell day" ... on June 29th?

Yep, sounds like a Russian holiday alright :)

The context is that it's the oldest inside Russian joke to make up random
occassions when drinking. You feel like having a drink, but can't justify it -
no problem, drink to the revitalizing power of parsley or to bid spring
farewell or something as silly.

------
billharrison
Happy Petrov day, everyone. I thought I was the only one that recognized this
holiday. Thanks, Omegant.

~~~
omegant
Happy Petrov day to you Bill!.

It´s in my calendar, and I´ve already wished all my friends happy Petrov day
(via Facebook).

------
Faust1985
Holding back a world on the brink of madness cant be easy. A good man.

~~~
arethuza
We are all fortunate that there were a lot of good people on both sides during
the Cold War.

------
mrleinad
Thankfully, we're on one of the multiple universes that had this guy to stop
nuclear armaggeddon from happening.

------
McUsr
If there were ever one guy that deserved the Nobel's Peace Prize, it would
have been him!

------
dajohnson89
So according to the wiki article:

-$30,000 from the Dresden Prize

-$1,000 from SF's World Citizen Award (does that even cover airfare from Russia?!)

Preventing nuclear disaster, it seems, is an undervalued skill. Mr. Petrov
needs to fire his publicist.

~~~
jonnathanson
An interesting part of the article is that he was actually _demoted_ after
averting nuclear disaster. This is because admitting that there was a fault in
the nuclear defense system would be tantamount to admitting that top Soviet
military and scientific minds were capable of error. Rather than embarrass the
regime, the military quietly moved Petrov out of the spotlight.

~~~
0xdeadbeefbabe
This bug in human nature makes me half wish they were destroyed, but the other
half of me wants to take eat, and be entertained.

------
vassilevsky
Software bugs are a threat to humanity.

~~~
AmVess
The See Also section at the bottom of that wiki article is enough to induce
serious pucker in even someone with tungsten-level constitution.

~~~
rainforest
Command and Control[1] offers a comprehensive compendium of nuclear incidents
if you're interested in more. It's quite remarkable that the US never faced an
accidental nuclear detonation, despite the SAC, Air Force and Navy's bickering
between themselves over control of them, and their refusal to fit safety
devices until late in the war.

My favourite anecdote is the code on all warheads on the US' Minuteman fleet
being set to 00000000 as an exercise in simultaneously conforming to and
circumventing requirements for PALs (locks to forbid misuse).

[1] : [http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/08/eric-
schlosser-c...](http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/08/eric-schlosser-
command-control-excerpt-nuclear-weapons)

~~~
arethuza
The book "One Minute to Midnight" about the Cuban Missile Crisis has a rather
long list of places during that confrontation that almost led to nuclear war.

[http://www.amazon.com/One-Minute-Midnight-Kennedy-
Khrushchev...](http://www.amazon.com/One-Minute-Midnight-Kennedy-
Khrushchev/dp/1400078911)

One fascinating one was a U2 getting lost on the way to the North Pole due to
the Northern Lights and flying back into the Soviet Union just at the _wrong_
time - alarming the Soviets and resulting in fighters being sent up by the US
to protect the ailing U2. Unfortunately, due to the US being at Defcon 2 the
fighters were only armed with nuclear air-to-air missiles.... The relief (for
a number of reasons) the U2 pilot felt when he eventually landed was,
understandably, rather intense!

Amazing book about a ghastly time.

------
Nux
Thank you, mr. Petrov!

------
timmillwood
I read that as Harry Potter Day. _sigh_

~~~
simias
The guy possibly prevented a global thermonuclear war and that's your comment?

~~~
timmillwood
It's my comment because it's the truth. I was tired. No need to downvote.

