Space shuttle landed today. Have you ever heard a sonic boom?  

I haven't thought about sonic booms for ages! I haven't heard any for years but when I was young I heard quite a few. My dad explained them to me and I loved to hear them, it was like a little taste of fourth of July.

No, I don't think I've ever heard a sonic boom. I imagine they are pretty loud, though. The nearest big city to where I live is Birmingham and they have a lot of steel plants and furnaces there. I remember a few times when I was younger when we would go there we would hear a blast from one of those sometimes. I'm sure a sonic boom is a lot louder. Kathy.

You used to be able to hear them all the time when I was younger but I think they passed a law against breaking the sound barrier over populated areas except for the shuttle landing.

I don't think I have ever heard a sonic boom. I have heard some seriously loud booms from aircraft but I'm not sure it would have been classified as a sonic boom. Having lived close to a military base we have experienced a lot of loud noises :)

I don't live close enough to the Cape to hear the sonic booms but if I did, it would bring back childhood memories. I remember when I was just a little tyke, I occasionally heard sonic booms. Of course that was before breaking the sound barrier was outlawed over the continental U.S. It certainly is a little startling when you hear one though, at least for a few moments until you realize what it was, especially now since they happen so infrequently. It won't be much longer and you won't ever hear them as the shuttle program is nearing it's end, another chapter complete in aviation history.

No but my wife did. I was working in Chicago at the time and my wife was at home in the suburbs, it was a couple of days after 9/11 and it scared her big time since she did not know what it was. She thought it was an explosion or an attack. She called me at work, and then ran out to ask a neighbor what they thought it was. Our neighbor is a little older than us and had heard one before and he told my wife he thought it was a sonic boom. he did not seem panicked but my wife called me again and said what is a sonic boom, I did not know either I had to ask. I don't know why we did not hear it in Chicago, maybe there is more noice there that drowned it out more.