So I recently moved to London, and I’ve been doing quite a bit of reading on the history of the city. I came across one statement I didn’t quite believe, but then I ran it past some Londoners and they seemed to confirm it. But I’m still not convinced.
Anyway, this newspaper article stated that the gunfire from the Battle of the Somme (1916) could be heard quite clearly from North London. We’re talking about 500km (300 miles) here, and I don’t think that sound can travel so far. Any physicists (or people who were alive in 1916 ;)) care to check this one for me?
The Krakatau volcanic eruption in the 1880s was heard at distances from 2000 to 3000 miles away, and I personally once clearly heard an explosion at an industrial plant in the Houston area that was about 30 miles from my position. It seems plausible that a major artillery battle could fall somewhere between those two values.
The artillery sound could be channeled in the lower atmosphere. When Mount St. Helens blew, I heard it on Vancouver Island. I seem to remember it reported at the time that people in Seattle didn’t.
well they heard the Messine mines too… But there was a mine operation at the Somme
The Lochnagar Crater (Lochnagar Mine Crater) located in the village of La Boisselle in France’s Picardie region, is the site where one of the first explosions of the Battle of the Somme took place on 1 July 1916.
Set off by British forces at 7:28am, the mine which created the Lochnagar Crater was one of the biggest ever detonated at that time and Lochnagar Crater itself is an astounding 100 metres (328 feet) in diameter and 30 metres (98 feet) deep.
When there is training at Fort Dix there are routinely complaints from 30 miles away about the booms. That is for 88mm mortars and occasional training with 155mm howitzers. Usually single shots with the occasional 6 round sheaf. First day of the battle the British fired 1.5 million rounds of artillery.
