Unusual Sonic Boom Over Central Florida

10-31-01 | Ovrtaxt

[ovrtaxt]

Did anyone else hear a single, very loud, very defined sonic boom over the north Tampa Bay area today about 11:00 AM? There was nothing on the news about it this evening.

It wasn't the shuttle, there was no shuttle landing today, and the shuttle makes a series of 'softer' booms as it decelerates over Florida. This is unusual because the jets that fly from MacDill Airbase in South Tampa (central command headquarters) have to follow a flight path out into the Gulf of Mexico before going supersonic. There was no jet engine noise at all.

[Dog Gone]

I'm in Houston. But I was inside at the time.

[sit-rep]

copy that...

[Samwise]

Eeeeeeeeeeuuuuuuuuhhh!

[Windy-Dave]

Hypersonic Beads on a string I betcha!

[ovrtaxt]

Thats even grosser!

[streetsmart]

Must have been some military exercise at Dill or Eglin. We must be testing some very good stuff. Let's Roll.

[Paul M]

Didn't notice. If I had, I would have chalked it up to "The Sound of Freedom".

[ovrtaxt]

Ive heard stories from friends on duty at Eglin. They say at night you can sometimes hear some rather strange machinery and other assorted moises that can't be identified. Everyone just lays there in the tent and says'I didn't hear that...'

[RBurke]

Im in north central florida, south of Tallahassee by 1 1/2 hrs....and north of tampa by 3 hours--Nothing heard here.

It was our boys, thats all that matters.

[yarddog]

I would be surprised if you heard the same boom since Pensacola is about 500 miles from Tampa.

I live about 60 miles NE of Eglin and spent a good part of the day outside and heard nothing.

[RightWhale]

It could have been a meteorite. Once in a while a middle sized one explodes at altitude and it can be loud. Bolide. It's not all that uncommon, most meteorites don't reach the ground intact.

[streetsmart]

I agree. My wife and I think we have so much more to bring to the battle that it would scare the s!!!! out of the sheep if we let it be known.

[yarddog]

My Father came out of WWII and went to work at Tyndall, then transferred to Eglin. I believe there are more odd goings on there than just about anyplace except maybe area 51.

One night I saw a really strange plane fly right over the house. It had rounded wings and looked sort of like the models I had seen of the stealth fighter. Only problem was when the real stealth fighter was shown it didn't have a round line on it.

Once when in college I was driving with four friends through the Eglin reservation only a few days after a war game had ended. We drove out on a dirt road, (defying warnings to keep out) and found a treasure trove of military junk, some of it still good. I recall a whole box full of batteries but they were different from regular ones. One of the guy's dad was a retired Colonel and he knew what they were and said he knew how to adapt them for use, so he got all of them. We also found several crates of 3.5 inch rockets. We knew enough to leave these alone.

[ovrtaxt]

Those 3.5" rockets would have fit nicely into an Estes Model Rocket! Ready for Show and Tell, mom!

[streetsmart]

Not only did I hear it, it shook the windows in the house. Big Time.

[yarddog]

Not doubting you one bit, just doubt it was the same one they heard in Tampa.

[ovrtaxt]

My Father came out of WWII and went to work at Tyndall, then transferred to Eglin. I believe there are more odd goings on there than just about anyplace except maybe area 51.

Yeah, there's a lot of acreage out there. Isn't it the largest AFB in terms of square miles?

[ovrtaxt]

Unless streetsmart was at one end of the supersonic flight and we were at the other. A beeline between the locations takes it out over the Gulf, so north of about Crystal River (the local nuke plant) would have heard nothing until the approach near Pensacola.

Only theory I can think of...

[stboz]

Once upon a time, we heard a very loud set of booms in Tampa and all along the west coast (back around 1980.) Turned out to be two 106s from Tyndall that scrambled to intercept a drug plane.

I remember the Phantoms, too. Boundary air control on the wings made 'em howl like banshees (another McDonnel airplane, I believe.)

[yarddog]

There is some disagreement on that. I think some people say Star City in Russia is larger. I do know the "Eglin Eagle" which was the base paper when I was a kid had on it's name plate section, the phrase, "world's largest air force base'.