Outbreak Day

Outbreak Day is the date that the Cordyceps brain infection reached critical mass. It occurred on September 26th, 2003, and resulted in a global pandemic of the Cordyceps fungus and subsequent collapse of modern society caused by those infected with it.^[1]

History[]

Prelude[]

In 1968, Doctor Neuman prophesied on an ABC talk show that the fungus known as Cordyceps would evolve to be able to infect humans. He suggested that this evolution would most likely occur due to global warming, wherein rising atmospheric temperatures would lead to the fungus mutating and adapting itself to tolerate the increased temperatures. As a by product of this change, the fungus would now be able to infect human hosts, whose internal body temperatures would have previously been too high for it to do so.^[1]

In 2003, this scenario became reality. The infection, classified as the Cordyceps brain infection, first emerged in Jakarta, Indonesia by September 23. Some of the first signs of its spread were noticed at a flour and grain factory. Referring to the flour and grain factory in Jakarta, Mycology Professor Ratna Pertiwi remarks that the location provides an excellent substrate for the fungus. Here, its deadly symptoms were observed in one of the workers and three others whom she infected. An additional fourteen workers also went missing due to infected-related attacks.^[2]

Despite warnings by Dr. Ratna Pertiwi to contain the outbreak through drastic measures, Jakarta's role in international flour and grain distribution caused contaminated products such as bread, cereal, and pancake mix to be distributed internationally, hitting shelves in the United States on Thursday, September 25. It reached a state of pandemic when people who consumed enough of the contaminated products over the following day soon became infected and began to be admitted en-masse to emergency rooms, quickly overwhelming hospitals in the process. Soon the fungus began influencing its infected host's behavior to start violently attacking people and try spreading it to others via biting and contact through bodily fluids.^[3]

Main outbreak[]

In the United States, the outbreak manifested on September 26, with large numbers of infected attacking and killing or infecting many uninfected people around them. By the early hours of September 27, the government declared a state of national emergency and mobilized the Federal Disaster Response Agency and the United States military, with the support of local law enforcement, to halt the spread of the infection.

In Austin, Texas, the military blocked the highway leading away from the city and set up a base for residents to flee to for refuge. Much of the city erupted into chaos; police cars rushed to various areas around the city, setting up roadblocks to contain citizens believed to be infected, only for the infected to overrun them. Gas leaks spread in the city, causing explosions which set the buildings ablaze. At least three passenger airliners made emergency takeoffs from a nearby airport and flew low over the city, with one of them suddenly banking steeply upwards before stalling mid-air and crashing down into and destroying half of an entire neighborhood.^[1]

By September 30, only towns and the countryside lacked a high infected presence. FEDRA officials sent out soldiers to these areas to retrieve the residents living there and escort them to the quarantine zones in the cities they created to prevent these areas falling to the infection. In Lincoln, Massachusetts, the military rounded up the town's citizens for evacuation to nearby Boston, where FEDRA had established a quarantine zone. However, after it was found that there was a lack of space in the quarantine zone, the soldiers executed all of the evacuees and left their bodies in a mass grave in a field outside of Lincoln. Only a single resident, Bill, survived because he distrusted the soldiers and hid in his survivalist bunker to avoid them, correctly deducing the fate of the other townspeople. Joel would later reveal to Ellie that FEDRA and the military justified the executions because killing the evacuees would prevent them from becoming infected.^[3]

Behind the scenes[]

• Although the source of the outbreak was not confirmed in-canon until "Long, Long Time", attentive viewers caught on to hints of its origins as early as the airing of the first episode: several who noticed references to Jakarta pointed out that the city is home to one of the world's largest flour and grain factories; additionally, Joel, Sarah, and Tommy avoid having flour-based products such as pancakes, biscuits, cookies, and cake on Outbreak Day, whereas the Adlers are seen consuming such products and eventually become infected.^[4]

References[]