"It was a mistake made during a standard procedure at the change over of a shift, and an employee pushed the wrong button," Ige told the CNN broadcaster on Saturday. He added that the warning was sent to mobile phones, and also appeared on TV and radio.
The US Federal Communications Commission announced that it has launched a probe into the false alert warning.
The US Pacific Command announced later that it had "detected no ballistic missile threat to Hawaii," calling the text message warning an error. White House responded to the news by saying that US President Donald Trump has been briefed on the situation, calling it an "emergency management exercise."
Hawaii's Governor David Ige apologized on Sunday for the false alert in a Twitter message. He also called for peace and de-escalation of the tensions around North Korea
"We are doing everything we possibly can to prevent this from happening again … We must also do what we can to demand peace and a de-escalation with North Korea, so that warnings and sirens can become a thing of the past," Ige wrote.
