James Sean Shields claimed the warning was a factor contributing to his medical emergency, while his girlfriend, Brenda Reichel, joined the suit on the basis she suffered emotional upset.

Officials in Hawaii issued a warning on January 13 that a ballistic missile was headed for the islands, prompting a state of “total hysteria and chaos”.

The plaintiffs, who are suing the state, argue that the authorities failed to rectify their error in good time – they took 38 minutes to retract the warning.

“[The couple] believed this message to be true and were extremely frightened and thought they were shortly going to die. They decided that there was not much they could do to protect themselves from this threat and decided that if they were going to die, they might as well die together on the beach,” the suit states.

Upon arrival at the beach, Shields called his children to say goodbye before he began to feel “a severe and painful burning in his chest area”. He had a heart attack at a community clinic where a doctor was able to save his life.

The employee who sent the alert was fired.