Compensation for Sonic Boom

[Lardbeast]

The speed of sound is actually a moving feast, depending on air pressure, temperature etc. As to insurance, most insurance policies for household and car have a war/hostilities exclusion clause, which mentions damage through sonic boom.

For practical purposes, at the levels where aircraft operate the only real factor is temperature. Square root of the ambient temperature in Kelvin multiplied by 38.945 will give you local speed of sound in knots.

As for compensation, airlines here would get claims from farmers re ruined crops from all over the country any time it was reported an aircraft returned to land, whether dumping fuel or not. Eventually an area was set aside for dumping fuel to avoid spurious claims from farmers out in the gramadoelas trying to cash in.

As it is, the concentration of any fuel dumped by the time it reached the ground would have been microscopic and of no consequence, taking into account flow rate, speed and altitude. There's a good reason crop sprayers fly under power lines.

As for chemtrails at FL 350... Pshaw!

 

[Stainmaster]

A nasty corporal sneaked up behind me and popped a crisp bag next to my head. It really made me jump. Every time a see a pack of crinkle cut salt and vinegar McCoy's I get a cold sweat on.

Can I claim compo?

 

[Who_Dat]

The last flying one crashed killing the pilot.

The Thunder City Lightning.

When the accident report came out, the list of defects and maintenance bypasses made horrific reading. The ejector seat firing cartridges were ten years out of date and coupled with the canopy failing to blow off, turned the aircraft into a flying coffin. The pilot didn't stand a hope in hell of getting out when it all went pear shaped.

 

[Yokel]

Got the very noisy Air Ambulance heliport in the hospital less than a mile away. Get woken most nights when it circles to land, it definitely loud at night and hard to sleep for a while after.

They can carry on as far as I'm concerned, I've only lost a bit of sleep but if they weren't there you or I could lose a wife, a son, grandkids, etc.

When local Plod had fixed wing, they published their sortie times and locations on the web, along with the reasons in generic terms. Spurious complaints dropped instantly.

I hope Plod published it afterwards and not before - though you never know in these days of blanking out faces in released CCTV footage.

People do like to complain. Someone once tried to send in a dry cleaning bill after they were rescued by a SAR helicopter because their dress had marks. Or they see a helicopter on a beach, and complain about blown sand.

 

[Unremarkable]

That's an unfair comparison .............................. Vietnam's far safer

You're not wrong; nowadays, at least.

"Gooooooooood morning Cwmbraaaaaaaaaaaan!"

 

[Daz]

You're not wrong; nowadays, at least.

"Gooooooooood morning Cwmbraaaaaaaaaaaan!"

Nothing than a B52 strike or 20 can't cure

 

[MOzanne]

What a glorious thing that must have been.

Got the heads up for an alert exercise when I was a kid in Cyprus before the draw-downs began... They put the lot in the sky Lightnings, Vulcans Victors Canberras and Buccs.. if you had fillings at the start they got shook loose...

 

[Legs]

Way back in the dim and distant early '80s I was a pad-brat living (when not at Boarding School) at RAF Wildenrath. There was nothing like standing at the fence at the end of the runway as flight after flight of Phantoms screamed and roared into the air leaving nothing but the earthquake in one's chest, the smoke and scent of burned jet fuel.

How am I not totally deaf?

 

[vvaannmmaann]

Way back in the dim and distant early '80s I was a pad-brat living (when not at Boarding School) at RAF Wildenrath. There was nothing like standing at the fence at the end of the runway as flight after flight of Phantoms screamed and roared into the air leaving nothing but the earthquake in one's chest, the smoke and scent of burned jet fuel.

How am I not totally deaf?

Pardon?

 

[Yokel]

This thread reminds of the joke of the woman telling of how the sound from a fire engine killed her husband.

Every Sunday we made love to the sound of the Church bells. But one day a fire engine went past, and he had a heart attack.

 

[baldbof]

Way back in the dim and distant early '80s I was a pad-brat living (when not at Boarding School) at RAF Wildenrath. There was nothing like standing at the fence at the end of the runway as flight after flight of Phantoms screamed and roared into the air leaving nothing but the earthquake in one's chest, the smoke and scent of burned jet fuel.

How am I not totally deaf?

Pull up a sandbag time.

Gutersloh, 1972 TacEval. 30+ Lightnings launched in the survival scramble. I was on BFI 6 (near the Battle Flight dispersal) at the time and they were all airborne in under five minutes. The noise was truly ear-splitting - a continuous wall of sound which pummelled my insides. I know it was over 30 jets because I counted that many as they went past then I got distracted. I was the duty POL man that day and knew I was in for a long shift.

 

[Gabion Groyne]

Way back in the dim and distant early '80s I was a pad-brat living (when not at Boarding School) at RAF Wildenrath. There was nothing like standing at the fence at the end of the runway as flight after flight of Phantoms screamed and roared into the air leaving nothing but the earthquake in one's chest, the smoke and scent of burned jet fuel.

How am I not totally deaf?

Doing 60-70 on my old bike heading up the A83 towards Glasgow, on a section beside the loch but enclosed by trees. My full face helmet wasn't great and I was deafened by the wind noise when all of a sudden - BANG - I thought wtf and nearly lost control. I just caught the shape of a grey-green Phantom and a plume of black smoke screaming up the loch. I have never sht myself so much in my life.

 

[cowgoesmoo]

They do go supersonic by accident, even then, I’m not sure I think compensation should be paid.

How do you prove any damage was caused by the boom? It it was capable of shaking some tiles off your roof I would suggest you should better maintain your property.

What if the plod or water fairies hit your car while they were responding to a call? Would you be happy to claim off your insurance and lose your NCB to pay for the damage they did?

 

[NSP]

Whisper Mode, available on this one:

View attachment 551363

Whisper mode on a Gazelle*...?? Who were they trying to kid...????!!!!!!







* Always knew when one of those was coming up the valley in my youth, rather than a Lynx or Sea King due to the distinctive - and loud - screaming noise, which I was led to believe was generated by the fenestron.

 

[Issi]

It was usually the pilot making that annoying high pitched sound.