[meteorite-list] Loud Boom Heard in Nebraska

From: Ron Baalke <baalke_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Fri, 22 Jun 2007 08:46:48 -0700 (PDT)
Message-ID: <200706221546.IAA06142_at_zagami.jpl.nasa.gov>

http://www.bellevueleader.com/site/tab3.cfm?newsid=18498991&BRD=2712&PAG=461&dept_id=559850&rfi=15

Officials: Loud boom probably a plane
Midlands News Service
June 20, 2007

It was just before 11 a.m. Wednesday when Bellevue police Capt. Herb
Evers heard the boom.

Evers was in the city's fleet maintenance facility, talking to a mechanic.

"The windows in the garage doors rattled," Evers said. "It was like you
could feel the concussion."

He thought a plane had exploded and called the base police at Offutt Air
Force Base. The person who answered the phone said, "Yeah, I know. We
heard it, too."

They weren't alone.

People heard the boom from Cunningham Lake on Omaha's northern edge to
Cass County, from La Vista to the west end of Council Bluffs.

Sarpy County emergency dispatchers fielded about 100 calls, while
Douglas County dispatchers were just as busy. OPPD also received a
number of calls.

Officials ruled out a number of things the boom wasn't: Fire. Explosion.
Earthquake. Meteorite.

So what caused metro-area residents to momentarily question their safety
around 11 a.m. Wednesday?

Most authorities are content with believing that the noise was the
result of an airplane exceeding the speed of sound, an event known as a
sonic boom.

Offutt has no planes that can make a sonic boom, but an F-16, which can
fly at twice the speed of sound, was flying over the central United
States Wednesday, said Lt. Col. Les Carroll of McEntire Joint National
Guard Base in Eastover, S.C.

He's still investigating to see if the plane was responsible for the
boom heard in the Omaha area.

Carroll said planes aren't allowed to fly fast enough to create a sonic
boom over U.S. land, except over some remote areas. They do conduct
training missions over the ocean, where speed isn't restricted the same way.

"It's rare," he said. "I'm sure if someone is responsible, they didn't
intend to do it."

Carroll did not identify the plane's destination, but said it was
scheduled for a paint job.

The lower the aircraft is traveling, the louder a sonic boom would
sound, said Ken Plotkin, chief scientist at Wyle Laboratories in Virginia.

He said sonic booms aren't dangerous, but they can be startling to
unsuspecting people and damaging to fragile objects, such as glass.
Received on Fri 22 Jun 2007 11:46:48 AM PDT