Human error at Minot Central Dispatch caused an emergency alert meant for the Berthold Ambulance District to mistakenly go out to hundreds of individuals Tuesday, according to the Ward County Emergency Management Office.

Emergency Management Director Jennifer Wiechmann said failure to uncheck a box when preparing the alert led to the errant message, which went out to 50 emails and 1,854 phones as texts or calls. The mistake was caught before it went to all 36,981 recipients indicated by the checked box.

The issue in this case differed from messages that went to a broader audience than intended following a recent train derailment near Burlington, Wiechmann said. In that case, messages asking people to call Central Dispatch about evacuation went out to people far from the derailment area because of a communication issue between the local system and a federal alert system. Central Dispatch also received a number of inquiry calls Tuesday from residents who received the ambulance alert.