Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Sonic booms

I hear them all the time where I caribou hunt. Scares the hell out of you when your glassing and everything is quiet, then BOOM! F16s and F35s from Fairbanks head south and meet with the F22s from Anchorage right overhead. Entertaining on a clear day watching them chase each other around though. I've had F16s come by so low you could see the pilot and give him a wave. Figured he was scouting for his own hunt at that point.

Welcome to the area. I do not live in Springfield but I do lots of new house Construction in South Springfield Nixa Ozark Rogersville area

Gosh, I miss sonic booms. When Dad was on a TDY or a significant cross country, he'd call and tell when to expect the boom, and sure enough, kaboom and he'd be home a couple hours later.

That’s a really cool association to have with sonic booms. It meant dad would be home soon. 👍

OP, I am in Laclede county, and we have been having one a day here, all week, 2 one day last week. The first of those, I heard the crack before the boom. Must have been right overhead. Whatever makes it is way up there, because I have only seen the plane that made it once, a couple weeks ago. Only saw him because it was an exceptionally clear day and he left a contrail as he was circling to gain elevation.

your windows should rattle eh Rocky ?

Hill down the road from ya

Never heard one and hope I never do.

Mom and Dad lived in a trailer park right next to the airport. Sonic booms a few times a week were normal. Usually early in the morn, 6:00 - 7:00 a.m. When they bought their 1st house 3 miles from the airport, Mom thought the booms would end. The house was in the flight path. They were a lot louder and shook the house. Mom was not pleased. Early 1960's.

I bet I haven't heard a boom for 40 years.

Was that you, Joe?

As a kid growing up in the 60's I remember hearing them at about 6 or 7 years old. We lived in Snellville Ga. (East of Atlanta). My dad was in the Air Force and stationed on Bermuda Island. I was born at the Air Force Base Hospital on Bermuda Island 11/2/1961. I remember one day being outside with dad and one of the first C-5A's flew by and my daddy told me it was the biggest plane in the world.
Stopped hearing them booms a couple of years before watching us land on the moon. "Those were the days!"

At about 0:11 and keep an eye on her hair. (41 second video)

Video uploaded to YouTube on Aug 3, 2021



As a side note, she's sitting in this:


B-25J Mitchell, "Betty's Dream"

That's not a sonic boom, now this is a sonic boom

I’m in Polk county. So I hear them along with ya

Yep. Used to hear them regularly growing up in the hill country. Haven’t heard one in ages!

Supersonic flight over the U.S. was banned in 1973 because it was considered a nuisance. I was born in 1968 and remember them regularly when I was a young kid.

In the early 90's I went into the Marine Corps after college and ended up flying F/A-18's after flight school. The rules now are that in order to go supersonic you have to be 30 miles offshore and pointed away from land (the shock wave propagates forward). There are a few military operating areas in the west over unpopulated areas where supersonic flight is allowed. Near Fallon NV as mentioned to support training out of the Navy base there as well as some around Edwards AFB. There are probably some others I'm not familiar with.

The F/A-18A model as mentioned in the video will supercruise (cruise supersonic without using the afterburners) if the pylons are removed from the wings. The pylons cause a huge amount of drag, more than the drop tank in fact. The F/A-18A has 16,000 lb thrust engines. The early F/A-18C's had the same engines but later builds got upgraded 18,000 lb thrust engines. Those jets would supercruise even with the pylons installed. Just barely though, a C model with the big engines, four pylons and a drop tank would get about mach 1.05 in the mid 20,000's at full power without the afterburners.

We used to get them frequently when I was a kid in NW Iowa circa 1960. That was when there was even less access to information about such things, and we at first wee alarmed by them, then only curious. We would run outside to look when one took place, and wondered why we never saw anything.

They must have a place somewhere over Georgia also. I see post on fakebook from Robins AFB warning of a sonic boom and what time they expect it to occur. Thinking it's a F-15s on a FCF after PDM is done.

I hear them regularly when hunting the canyons around Roswell. I suspect the proximity to White Sands/Holloman/Ft. Bliss has something to do with it.

I haven't heard one since the late 70's. I actually miss hearing them.