I registered here for the sake of responding to this thread, specifically. I'm from the United States and I've been investigating these mysterious loud booms being heard worldwide since I experienced a series of strange incidents in early 2011 with booms that would shake our house (and no official explanation was ever given). What caught my attention were the constant reports I'm seeing coming out of Coventry on Twitter. This is the third wave of reports I've seen in a matter of months. The first wave of reports was in April. This was the "official" explanation:
Sonic Boom Rocks Large Part of Britian as two Typhoon jets are dispatched to helicopter emitting hijacking signal
But upon reading the official explanations, I and others noticed a few inconsistencies. For starters, in the above article you'll see several photos. One containing the two fighter jets and an unidentified flying object - obviously not a helicopter. Also, it should be noted that under normal circumstances, aircraft are NOT supposed to break the sound barrier in residential areas because it's dangerous. So why didn't they attempt to get in communication with this helicopter to make sure that there was an actual emergency? Why put the residents at risk over a false alarm? Surely, if the helicopter had been hijacked, they would attempt negotiations by communicating with those on-board.
An anonymous person made a valid point on another
forum:
"Yes, sonic booms are heard roughly under the flight path of a plane travelling above the speed of sound, for as long as it is doing so, be that 100 miles or 1,000 miles.
What the OP is, I think, alluding to is the fact that if the Typhoon jets took off from their QRA duty at an Oxfordshire base (Brize Norton?), and they flew to the area around Bath (which is where the MoD claims the incident happened with the helicopter) then why was the 'sonic boom' heard, and felt, almost 100 miles north, in Coventry, and also in Staffordshire (even further north. I live in the West Midlands and it has been on the local news)?
The point is that the official explanation seems very suspicious. Go to Google Earth and you will see what I mean. If the jets were responding to a helicopter emergency around bath then they would have had a short, fast, and relatively low-level dash of only around 50 miles to get there. Would they have needed to go supersonic for 50 miles? Even if they did then why would the residents of Coventry and around Staffordshire have heard this? Even if the jets flew over those areas after the incident then surely they would not have been flying supersonic after it. They would only have been authorised to fly supersonic for the emergency situation.
Please, just go to Google Earth and explain it. I'd love to understand how this makes any sense."
With all of that in mind, you may still be inclined to brush it off. But about a month ago I saw a new slew of reports coming out of Coventry from residents stating they heard multiple loud booms and felt their houses shaking. Apparently it had even been mentioned on the radio. I was unable to find an official explanation for those incidents. And here we are again. End of December. Here are a few of the reports I've seen on Twitter today:
@kensthought
"Heard a loud bang just after 1am sunday in west coventry. don't know what or where."
@suetid
"@SkyBluesTalk we did in CV5 area again didn't take it, in any idea."
