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Have you ever heard or experienced a sonic boom?


Muledeer

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I've experienced a sonic boom three times in my lifetime.

 

Have you ever heard one?  I think they're terrifying.

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I think so (memory could be fuzzy and/or incorrect, since it was a long time ago, in southern California, if it did happen)

I seem to recall it being similar to thunder.

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We get that a lot around LA from space vehicles and military flights. The main thing is that an earthquake can start any second, so when you hear a low rumble your ears perk up.

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Only in Street Fighter and Metroid Prime 2.

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Even though we live 30 km away from a military airbase, we hear test flights quite often, day and night. Sometimes you would hear a very lound 'Bang' while the sky is completely blue. You then know that it is was not thunder.

 

Fighter planes once had to investigate a prototype drone gone out of control. The NATO headquarters are hosted less than 100 km away from our airbases so military are also intercepting possible treats to this organisation - like unanounced Russian jets.

 

 

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Yes. At a military air show, during a jet demonstration.

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SorryNotSorry

Used to hear and feel them here in L.A. back in the days when the Space Shuttles would land. Not exactly like thunder, fireworks, or an earthquake, more like all three, in the sense that you can't necessarily tell which direction it's coming from, it just announces itself.

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Nope, but over here military aircraft are not allowed to go supersonic over land except during times of war or similar emergency. But most of our military airfields are within five to ten minutes flying time from blue water anyway 

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Yes. I remember thinking the windows would crack from just the sound.

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  • 3 weeks later...
Anonymous Axolotl

Yeah, when I would go to air shows when I was younger. Experiencing a sonic boom was always such a surreal feeling that I still distinctly remember despite it being years since I've last felt one.

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Grumpy Alien
On 7/3/2019 at 2:43 PM, Anonymous Axolotl said:

Yeah, when I would go to air shows when I was younger. Experiencing a sonic boom was always such a surreal feeling that I still distinctly remember despite it being years since I've last felt one.

I’ve been to air shows and this is the first time I’ve heard of a sonic boom. If you hear it air shows, I guess I have? I don’t remember ever hearing anything surreal though and I’m only mildly Hard of Hearing.

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Anonymous Axolotl
1 hour ago, disGraceful said:

I’ve been to air shows and this is the first time I’ve heard of a sonic boom. If you hear it air shows, I guess I have? I don’t remember ever hearing anything surreal though and I’m only mildly Hard of Hearing.

You'd only hear it if any of the planes broke the sound barrier, and I know that's not done at all air shows. Only certain types of planes can pull that off anyhow. It leaves a briefly visible but weird looking cloud around parts of the plane: 1200px-FA-18_Hornet_breaking_sound_barri

As for the sound, it's not strictly a sound. The reason I say it was a "surreal" experience it's felt through the whole body, but mostly in the chest cavity and sternum. It's sort of like a bizarre vibrating feel. It's difficult to describe, but it's stuck with me all these years because of how unique it sounded/felt.

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On 6/16/2019 at 9:53 PM, Woodworker1968 said:

Used to hear and feel them here in L.A. back in the days when the Space Shuttles would land. Not exactly like thunder, fireworks, or an earthquake, more like all three, in the sense that you can't necessarily tell which direction it's coming from, it just announces itself.

I also used to hear the Shuttles come in when I worked in that area. The Shuttles were one of the few aircraft large enough that both the leading and trailing shocks could be heard separately, i.e Buh-Boom!

 

Sonic booms are tricky things to forecast, as atmospheric conditions can affect how strongly they're heard at ground level. Sometimes the Shuttle booms were loud enough to rattle windows, at other times (on the same flight paths) we'd hear nothing.

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On 6/17/2019 at 10:42 AM, Skycaptain said:

Nope, but over here military aircraft are not allowed to go supersonic over land except during times of war or similar emergency. But most of our military airfields are within five to ten minutes flying time from blue water anyway 

Apparently they did recently - two RAF planes were lauched to escort  a commercial flight back to Stansted
https://metro.co.uk/2019/07/18/jet2-fines-chloe-haines-85000-air-rage-forced-emergency-landing-10407906/

 

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