Red alert has been part of Star Trek since the 1960s series, and Star Trek: The Next Generation, broadcast from 1987 to 1994, updated the alarm for the USS Enterprise-D. In the show it marks the highest level of emergency, sending the crew to battle stations during attacks, malfunctions and first-contact crises. As Next Generation scenes were clipped for fan videos and early internet soundboards, the short klaxon became a standalone shorthand for sci-fi danger, and it remains widely reused in memes, streams and edits far beyond Trek fandom.