{"id":28482,"date":"2025-05-26T09:00:45","date_gmt":"2025-05-26T09:00:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=28482"},"modified":"2025-05-26T09:23:03","modified_gmt":"2025-05-26T09:23:03","slug":"what-sonic-detectives-listen-for-when-rockets-launch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=28482","title":{"rendered":"What Sonic Detectives Listen for When Rockets Launch"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Rocket launches are loud, and big rockets are louder. Launches used to be occasional spectacles, and not many people minded the noise.<\/p>\n

But the pace has quickened. SpaceX, the rocket company started by Elon Musk, now sends a Falcon 9 rocket to space at least once every few days<\/a> from launchpads in Florida and California. Other companies, including Jeff Bezos\u2019 Blue Origin<\/a>, also have ambitions to send rockets to space at an accelerating pace.<\/p>\n

And the noise is no longer just the roar of the rockets heading upward, but also the sonic booms of rocket boosters returning to Earth.<\/p>\n

That noise shakes windows and foundations and wakens sleeping people. How the sound waves travel \u2014 shifted by wind, bending and reflecting off layers of the atmosphere and the ground below \u2014 is complex. Rules and limits that were designed for airports and rock concerts may not suffice.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cThere is a gap in the science,\u201d said Kent Gee, a professor of physics and astronomy at Brigham Young University in Utah who is one of the few scientists studying the sounds of spaceflight. \u201cWe don\u2019t know what people actually find acceptable.\u201d<\/p>\n

And SpaceX is testing Starship<\/a>, the largest and likely the loudest rocket ever. To fulfill his dreams of sending people to Mars one day<\/a>, Mr. Musk envisions a steady parade of Starships launching from sites in Texas and Florida.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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<!–>A SpaceX booster falling back to Earth faster than the speed of sound generates a triple sonic boom: boom buh-boom<\/span>.–><\/p>\n

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[–><!–>A simulation of a Falcon 9 booster returning to Earth shows cones of \u2b24<\/span>\u00a0high pressure and \u2b24<\/span>\u00a0low pressure as it falls through the atmosphere.–><!–><\/p>\n

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[–><!–>The falling booster compresses air into a high-pressure shockwave, which is heard as an initial BOOM<\/span>.–><!–><\/p>\n

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[–><!–>A second BUH<\/span> is generated by low pressure from the lower parts of the booster meeting high pressure from the fins that steer the booster\u2019s descent.–><!–><\/p>\n

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[–><!–>A low-pressure wake behind the booster creates the third BOOM<\/span> as air pressure returns to normal.–><!–><\/p>\n

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Rocket launches are loud, and big rockets are louder. Launches used to be occasional spectacles, and not many people minded the noise.But the pace has quickened. SpaceX, the rocket company started by Elon Musk, now sends a Falcon 9 rocket to space at least once every few days from launchpads in Florida and California. Other companies, including Jeff Bezos\u2019 Blue Origin, also have ambitions to send rockets to space at an accelerating pace.And the noise is no longer just the roar of the rockets heading upward, but also the sonic booms of rocket boosters returning to Earth.That noise shakes windows and foundations and wakens sleeping people. How the sound waves travel \u2014 shifted by wind, bending and reflecting off layers of the atmosphere and the ground below \u2014 is complex. Rules and limits that were designed for airports and rock concerts may not suffice.\u201cThere is a gap in the science,\u201d said Kent Gee, a professor of physics and astronomy at Brigham Young University in Utah who is one of the few scientists studying the sounds of spaceflight. \u201cWe don\u2019t know what people actually find acceptable.\u201dAnd SpaceX is testing Starship, the largest and likely the loudest rocket ever. To fulfill his dreams of sending people to Mars one day, Mr. Musk envisions a steady parade of Starships launching from sites in Texas and Florida.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":28484,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28482","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28482","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=28482"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28482\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28485,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28482\/revisions\/28485"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/28484"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=28482"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=28482"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=28482"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}