Stopping a M.O.A.B is an urban legend related to the 2011 first-person shooter game Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3.
Description
In Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 multiplayer, players are awarded with powerful items by going on high point streaks. For example, if a player earns 7 points without dying, they can call in an attack helicopter to support their team and force opponents away from objective positions and into buildings. Points are earned by completing actions such as killing opponents or capturing flags. There is one reward however that can only be earned by going on a 25 kill streak, meaning support actions such as capturing flags will not count towards the progress of obtaining it.
This item is the M.O.A.B (Massive Ordnance Air Blast), a huge bomb that has devastating effects unlike any other point streak in the game. The M.O.A.B will kill all opponents when it goes off as well as destroy their point streaks and cause an EMP effect that prevents any opposing point streaks being called in as well as disable enemy electronics. Another effect of the M.O.A.B is that all players on the team of the player who called it in will receive double XP for the rest of the match.[1]
Once a M.O.A.B is called in, all players in the game will be informed and a countdown will be displayed on screen and it seems there is nothing that can be done to stop it. However, throughout 2012, rumors would circulate on forum threads online claiming that if you were on the opposing team of a M.O.A.B, you could stop it from reaching the map by shooting it out of the sky with a rocket launcher.[2] This rumor gained serious traction once a video was uploaded to YouTube by JIMBOTHY on May 23, 2012, in which it showed him shooting an enemy M.O.A.B out of the sky by locking onto it with a Javelin guided missile and hitting it.[3]
Participants in the threads discussing JIMBOTHY’s video were quick to debunk it however, with some calling out the font of the “stopped M.O.A.B” message that appears on screen being different to the regular font used in the game and the fact that his javelin does not seem to consume ammunition when firing off the missile.[4] JIMBOTHY would later update the video’s title to include “(PARODY)”, quashing any doubt remaining about its authenticity.