Stanislav Yevgrafovich Petrov (Russian: Станисла́в Евгра́фович Петро́в; born c. 1939) is a retired lieutenant colonel of the Soviet Air Defence Forces. On September 26, 1983, he was the duty officer at the command center for the Oko nuclear early-warning system when the system reported a missile being launched from the United States. Petrov judged that the report was a false alarm. This decision is credited with having prevented an erroneous retaliatory nuclear attack on the United States and its NATO allies, which would have likely resulted in large-scale nuclear war. Investigation later confirmed that the satellite warning system had malfunctioned.… He received no reward. According to Petrov, this was because the incident and other bugs that were found in the missile detection system embarrassed his superiors and the influential scientists who were responsible for the system, so that if he had been officially rewarded, they would have had to have been punished. He was reassigned to a less sensitive post, took early retirement (although he emphasizes that he was not “forced out” of the army, as the case is presented by some Western sources), and suffered a nervous breakdown. Petrov is now a pensioner, spending his retirement in the town of Fryazino, Russia. teh fp
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Stanislav Yevgrafovich Petrov (Russian: Станисла́в Евгра́фович Петро́в; born c. 1939) is a retired lieutenant colonel of the Soviet Air Defence Forces. On September 26, 1983, he was the duty officer at the command center for the Oko nuclear early-warning system when the system reported a missile being launched from the United States. Petrov judged that the report was a false alarm. This decision is credited with having prevented an erroneous retaliatory nuclear attack on the United States and its NATO allies, which would have likely resulted in large-scale nuclear war. Investigation later confirmed that the satellite warning system had malfunctioned.…

He received no reward. According to Petrov, this was because the incident and other bugs that were found in the missile detection system embarrassed his superiors and the influential scientists who were responsible for the system, so that if he had been officially rewarded, they would have had to have been punished. He was reassigned to a less sensitive post, took early retirement (although he emphasizes that he was not “forced out” of the army, as the case is presented by some Western sources), and suffered a nervous breakdown. Petrov is now a pensioner, spending his retirement in the town of Fryazino, Russia.

teh fp

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  1. parksfernandez reblogged this from duanefernandez and added:
    This is just the saddest.
  2. duanefernandez posted this