@CorrectiveAction Picture the sonic boom as a cone-shaped wake, such as what a boat does in the water. Close up to the boat the wake is less than a foot wide, but as you go out, the wake expands to several feet wide. The shuttle is the same, up close the two wavefronts formed by the nose and wingtips are practically on top of each other, but as they spread out behind the shuttle, they separate by hundreds of feet. Even so, they're still less than three seconds apart when we hear them.
Runways are indeed numbered by the direction they are aligned with. At the Space Center the one 15,000 foot runway there is numbered runway 15/33, by adding a zero to 15 it tells pilots that the runway is aligned more or less with 150 degrees or southeast. If a pilot were landing or taking off from the opposite direction the runway is called runway 33. Add zero to 33 and the runway is therefore aligned with 330 degrees or northwest.
+Don Browne That is all true. Infact they use magnetic north and because of the shifting of the poles, they have to regularly renumber the run ways. Tampa International made national news a few years back because of the original 36/18 runway scheme.
Sonic booms at re-entry mark the moment the shuttle goes from super sonic to sub sonic. At the exact moment of the speed of sound, all sounds produced by any aircraft 'piles' up around the aircraft, thus amplifying the sound and producing the 'boom'. So you have a boom when crossing the sound barrier, either up or down in speed.
Fun fact: All supersonic aircraft have a double sonic boom, it's just that the shuttle's large enough for them to occur further apart, and so audibly distinct.
Shuttle moves so fast it changes chaotic movement of air molecules, hitting his airframe, generally in one direction. Producing mat conic form of dynamic pressure as a result you see, and hear when it reach ears.
As the commentator correctly points out, it is a misconception that the sonic boom only happens when the shuttle crosses the sound barrier. The sonic boom is heard when the shock wave from a supersonic object passes the listener. The shockwave is continually present with the any object that's supersonic.
Mark OHara According to wikipedia there is no mention of booms occurring "every time it decreases from" Mach speed. The two booms (coming from the nose and tail) are continuous as the craft travels over the earth but only heard by observers when the craft is traveling at Mach I or higher and travels over the observer. That's why the booms heard on my video are there, as the shuttle was flying over my Southwest Florida location at greater than Mach 1 at the time, on the way to landing a hundred or so miles northeast of my location.
Mark OHara Think of the sonic boom as a wave caused by a boat travelling parallel to the beach. The wave will reach different people along the beach at different times, as the wave travels along the beach, and it is being continuously created by the boat. The sonic boom is very similar, but in 3D. It is being created continuously by the aircraft and different people on the ground will hear it at different times, as the shock wave intersects the ground along the flight path.
I'm not 100% sure but the sonic boom results from the doppler effect. The sound waves compress infront of the vehicle like the do when an ambulance passes you. The sound is higher when it comes in your direction and the sound is lower when it moves away from you. Right at the speed of sound something magic happens. All the sound it does superimposes in a single spot infront of the craft. This is the sonic boom which can only last as long the craft flies at exactly the speed of sound. This occurs for just a moment when accelerating above the speed of sound and decelerating below it. Traveling at higher speeds is still very loud but it does no more boom. This is why it is very difficult for pilots to create a sonic boom at the right spot when they fly by. There is no continous sonic boom when the plane is super sonic as far as I know. I may be wrong though. I'm not quite sure what the sound does after it is compressed to the max. It might stay superimposed or is simply not traveling infront of the vehicle anymore just behind. I guess it depends on where it is created. It must also be created right at the front where the air is compressed so I guess I'm just wrong :-) I'll dig that later.
GermanRider You got it wrong. Any aircraft flying at or above the speed of sound will continuously generate a shockwave that will be perceived as a sonic boom by people on the ground once the shockwave passes by them. Think of it as a bow wave generated by a boat that travels parallel to a beach. Different people at the beach will be hit by the wave at different times, as the boat drives along. Same thing happens with the shock wave. The difference between flying at exactly M1 or above is that when the speed is equal to M1 the shock wave is a plane that is orthogonal to the direction of flight. As speed increases past M1, the shockwave becomes conical, with the cone angle increasing with speed above M1. In either case (speed=M1 or speed > M1), as the shockwave meets people on the ground along the flight path, they will hear the sonic boom, so different people will hear the boom at different times depending on their location below the flight path. This is well known for many decades, a good read on the subject should clear it up.
Man I'll miss hearing the twin sonic booms everyday it came in. It'd shake the house even in Orlando. Sucks, I hate not being to go in my backyard and not see the shuttle go off. :\
Truly an amazing era of space exploration during the shuttle program. I hope SpaceX can come up with another amazing era. Kind of sad where we are presently.
kq4ym, thanks for posting this video. "2012failure", it's not a hologram. It's actual video used from a guided camera and not IR, just a filter. (NASA) I've been watching shuttle landings since the 80's @ Edwards AFB. an awesome thing to experience out there. it didn't only rattle windows, it broke them...along with SR-71 flights 50 feet off the deck and haulin' the mail, amongst a few others seen there.
All of you are partially correct. For most of the reentry, the computers are in control, but when, the speed and altitude are low enough, most shuttle commanders take over with manual control. The switch between commander and pilot (commander = pilot, pilot = copilot, if you will) while flying the HAC (heading alignment cone). So yes, the stick is passed back and forth during landing, but the commander always lands, the pilot just gets 20 seconds during decent.
@kq4ym the shockwave in the front travels faster than the one in the back, thus with more distance to the source the shocks will travel apart. i dont think the lenght of the vehile does matter that much. special about the shuttle booms is the distance you can hear it from, so they sound more apart than from other (lower flying) aircraft.
@kq4ym A sonic boom is created at the front and at the tail of an aircraft. The length of the space shuttle adds a delay between the two compared to a small fighter jet.
Once out in Oregon's back country while camping I woke to piss, flipped up the canopy door, I let down the tail gate, stood up to piss at around 3:30 in the a.m. while raining out at the time I heard this loud loud tremendous noise from all around and thought "Damn what the hell was that as I was ducking back in closing tailgate and canopy door. I covered back up and then on battery operated boombox, the one raidio station DJ came on and said Hey if you were up and about within the last few minutes or so, there was a loud sonic boom in our night sky as a space shuttle was descending into California for a nightime landing. That was some pretty cool news.
You seem to be wrong too. That indicates that there is 5,000 feet left of runway. In fact, If it had been a runway label, it would be red. In fact, the runway the shuttle landed on was runway 15, with a magnetic bearing of 155, and a length of 15,001 feet. This means that the shuttle used up approximately 10,500 feet of runway.
Question about twin sonic booms: Why are they, say a half second apart? I understand the cause of the two booms, but the source of those two booms would be a fraction of a second apart relative to a fixed point on the ground, since the vehicle is still supersonic. Anyone got a valid explanation?
The computers generally controlled the flights from the time the shuttle launched until final approach. Then in the final few thousand feet or so the control is handed over to the pilot.
Actually he is correct. the shuttle was indeed moving at Subsonic speeds when you hear the booms at 3:19. that was the boom as the Shuttle traveled at Mach 1. and as it dropped to Mach 0.99. You only hear the Sonic boom as a vehicle passes Mach 1. any speed after that you will no longer hear it. Notice around 2:50 it sound silent until the Shuttle reaches Mach 1 or the speed of sound around 3:15. as just before it becomes subsonic it creates it's Sonic boom
the first one at 0:22 was the reenter procedure in the atmosphere.this happens with every shuttle and this is the point where columbia broke up cause the heat is around 3100 c and it is enough to melt the material it was made it and thus it broke up. the second one near 3:20 was like someone dabbing a microphone
@1Gaumer There generally is more than one boom, this is due to parts of the craft moving faster than the rest. Alot of the time the craft is too small to distinguish more than one boom. as kq4ym says the shuttle is alot larger so two are heard.
The reason they say this is because the CMDR always gives the PLT 10 to 30 seconds of actual flying time during the landing phase. Most of the pilots are first time flyers who never get actual flying time until their first flight. All of it is done on simulators. So this gives them a window to fly in before the CMDR does the actual landing.
There is a lot of things that are done manually during landings. The gear is dropped by the pilot when they reach a certain air speed. The computer is not involved. The chute is deployed manually, the air speed indicators deployed, computer program imputs, deactivate reaction control jets, turn off heater systems, control speed brake. I could go on and on. The last five minutes are flown by the CMDR.
The two booms have absolutely zero to do with the size of the craft. ANY aircraft breaking the sound barrier will cause two booms. We normally don't hear them separately because the two are in such close succession (aka the aircraft is too close, they sound like one boom) Since the shuttle is so far away the two booms have time to separate, giving us the two booms.
To get to the Space Station, you do have to fly over Great Britain! Don't worry, though. They had altered their launch trajectory many years ago to drop the tank in the Pacific Ocean. If you hear them say after MECO (Main Engine Cut-Off), "OMS-1 not required" then they are on a path to put the tank in the Pacific, not the Indian Ocean.
@amgen52 Yes one part is moving faster than the other. And the rest of what you said is just what I said. The shuttle is larger so two are heard more prominently. but not always two booms are created. As some craft are slower at reaching the barrier than others it sometimes creeps to the barrier then slows down therefore only creating one boom as after breaching the barrier forces change drastically.
Great video and thanks for the commentary. Where were you shooting from and how did you have the audio from the shuttle and command center? It was amazing to watch Discovery glide down for a perfect landing! Oh~ the front landing gear sure looks small compared to the size of the shuttle!! Thanks again, Don.
@largferg Discovery did not get destroyed. We lost Challenger on 1/28/1986 and Columbia on 2/1/2003. Discovery is slated to launch for the last time in February 2011.
@MovieMad007 Can't be true. The SRBs separate 70-some seconds after lift off getting it to just over 150,000ft. You can see them separate with the naked eye standing on the ground in Florida. I know, I've seen it. That happens about 20-30 miles into the flight. The SRBs are towed back to KSC by boat.
@kq4ym there are certain flight paths that are allowed for military aircraft over US land... I used to live near one. Kinda fun except when things would fall off the walls and all
Re-entry has nothing to do with the sonic boom. When the orbiter goes below Mach 1 at about 50,000 feet you hear the sonic boom because the shock wave is traveling up and down. At launch when the orbiter travels vertical and breaks the sound barrier , the shock wave travels horizontal to the ground and never gets to the ground.
@@jrockett73 , It never breaks the sound barrier at launch dude. My gf lived in Cocoa Beach is what you need to know. No sonic boom.at launch. I've heard too many F-16 break the sound barrier to know what it sounds like. Nothing like any launch I've ever heard. By the way at re entry it has nothing to do with which direction the sound is traveling. Either you break the sound barrier or you dont. This is not debatable. Like I said I've heard F-16 traveling parallel to the ground while breaking the sound barrier. Not a good explanation at all dude.
You don't understand. The shuttle most certainly does break the sound barrier during launch. It goes from zero to 17,500mph to orbit the earth. It breaks the sound barrier in less than a minute. At launch the shock wave travels horizontal and never reaches the ground. Thats why you never hear a missile break the sound barrier either. An F-16 like the shuttle during landing either breaks the barrier accelerating above 750 or breaks it decelerating below 750. The key is that the shock wave travels vertical and hits the ground. This isn't my theory but basic physics. There are many videos that even show the orbiter breaking the sound barrier during launch. You can see it but can't hear it. Look it up...
Thanks for sharing this video, and the information you share. My kids and I visit Kennedy Space center/ NASA in oct 2009, what an experience! I was wondering, is there any engines running when it deorbit, or is it just gliding home?
@Italoenigma I was at the first three shuttle landings at Edwards AFB.... and the 26th. You are loooookin' and looooookin' wondering where it is in the sky. Then... BOOM!!! BOOM!!! About 1/8 second apart. The crowd cheers and there she is... A bright white dot in the insanely blue California sky.
I remember in 2009 getting to hear firsthand what a space shuttle sonic boom sounded like i was expecting it but it still made me jump out of my skin it was quite loud
@kq4ym Just so ya know, there are specific places over land military jets can break the sound barrier. There are restricted areas and ranges as well as regular routes over fairly populated areas with the caveat that it must be done very high, i.e. above FL300. :-D
Came here to listen sonic boom then i m stunned with the beauty of space shuttles fly footage.. this is like a big white whale swimming in a crystal clear ocean.
I don't understand why you said that there was two sonic booms, one almost at the beginning of the video 0:22 and the other one almost in the middle 3:19. The sonic boom is because the shuttle is entering into the atmosphere right?
I was younger than 13 (but at age 11) and I was playing my eletronic piano in my room with my door shut and all of a sudden (BOOM) it made me jump high and the boom shook my house. :O
@kq4ym Up no. The space shuttle decends at over 10,000ft a minute. If it was at 36,000ft it would hit the ground like 30 miles short of the runway. 20 degree glideslope vs 3 degrees for an airliner.
I would be inclined to agree with you on the sonic booms. You hear them because the plane IS going super sonic. If it turns and is going super sonic the sonic boom will continue the same direction and you will hear it. but you are hearing it because it turned not because it is subsonic. While it makes sense to say that when you hear the booms when it is sub sonic I really would be curious exactly when the shuttle goes subsonic in the turn and when you hear the booms.
Let me get this right. Did you say this was being filmed by your video camera as it passed over YOUR house? If that is so.....how come the video coverage (at the part you claim to be filming) says NASA on it?Hmmmm????
I used to live in Florida, and one day I heard an absolutely DEAFENING noise, almost enough to get me on the ground in pain. Not until recently did I realize it was a sonic boom, though I'm not sure if it was from a Space shuttle, or fighter jet, or what.
By any chance were you on the north side of North Hutchinson Island or the surrounding area? That's basically across one of the Indian River inlets from Kennedy Space Center.
Local speed of sound (LSS) is only and exclusively related with temperature not size of aircraft or so... speed of sound could happen as speed increases or decreases, not necessarily when only increases.. incorrect information given by the guy who is making comments
Someone explain to me why one pilot gives up the controls to another pilot? Is one better at turning the craft and aligning it or sumin? Wouldn't it be better if they had just 1 bad ass pilot that could do it all so you wouldn't havta switch?
Two pilots are common in most flight situations in complex aircraft. This allows duties to be split, and a co-pilot also can serve to make sure all procedures are carried out correctly as an additional safety check. :Piloting a space shuttle is not quite the same as driving a car to the grocery store and back. Any additional help in piloting adds to the safety and efficiency of the trip.
@CorrectiveAction Picture the sonic boom as a cone-shaped wake, such as what a boat does in the water. Close up to the boat the wake is less than a foot wide, but as you go out, the wake expands to several feet wide. The shuttle is the same, up close the two wavefronts formed by the nose and wingtips are practically on top of each other, but as they spread out behind the shuttle, they separate by hundreds of feet. Even so, they're still less than three seconds apart when we hear them.
As a space enthusiast from the UK this is a beautiful thing. It's a real shame the shuttle is no more.
Runways are indeed numbered by the direction they are aligned with. At the Space Center the one 15,000 foot runway there is numbered runway 15/33, by adding a zero to 15 it tells pilots that the runway is aligned more or less with 150 degrees or southeast. If a pilot were landing or taking off from the opposite direction the runway is called runway 33. Add zero to 33 and the runway is therefore aligned with 330 degrees or northwest.
+Don Browne That is all true. Infact they use magnetic north and because of the shifting of the poles, they have to regularly renumber the run ways. Tampa International made national news a few years back because of the original 36/18 runway scheme.
Sonic booms at re-entry mark the moment the shuttle goes from super sonic to sub sonic. At the exact moment of the speed of sound, all sounds produced by any aircraft 'piles' up around the aircraft, thus amplifying the sound and producing the 'boom'. So you have a boom when crossing the sound barrier, either up or down in speed.
3:20 transonic boom,down subsonic
Great video and commentary thanks!
Thank you for posting this. Great vid
Thanks for sharing. I’ve been trying to find video of the sonic boom from the space shuttle for my son.
Wow! Glad you found it. Thanks for watching!
Mark was an amazing pilot of the shuttle. What a graceful landing
Fun fact: All supersonic aircraft have a double sonic boom, it's just that the shuttle's large enough for them to occur further apart, and so audibly distinct.
Shuttle moves so fast it changes chaotic movement of air molecules, hitting his airframe, generally in one direction.
Producing mat conic form of dynamic pressure as a result you see, and hear when it reach ears.
As the commentator correctly points out, it is a misconception that the sonic boom only happens when the shuttle crosses the sound barrier. The sonic boom is heard when the shock wave from a supersonic object passes the listener. The shockwave is continually present with the any object that's supersonic.
the booms occur for every time it decreases from a mach speed, in orbit it is mach 5+ (5 times the speed of sound)
Mark OHara According to wikipedia there is no mention of booms occurring "every time it decreases from" Mach speed. The two booms (coming from the nose and tail) are continuous as the craft travels over the earth but only heard by observers when the craft is traveling at Mach I or higher and travels over the observer. That's why the booms heard on my video are there, as the shuttle was flying over my Southwest Florida location at greater than Mach 1 at the time, on the way to landing a hundred or so miles northeast of my location.
Mark OHara Think of the sonic boom as a wave caused by a boat travelling parallel to the beach. The wave will reach different people along the beach at different times, as the wave travels along the beach, and it is being continuously created by the boat. The sonic boom is very similar, but in 3D. It is being created continuously by the aircraft and different people on the ground will hear it at different times, as the shock wave intersects the ground along the flight path.
I'm not 100% sure but the sonic boom results from the doppler effect. The sound waves compress infront of the vehicle like the do when an ambulance passes you. The sound is higher when it comes in your direction and the sound is lower when it moves away from you.
Right at the speed of sound something magic happens. All the sound it does superimposes in a single spot infront of the craft. This is the sonic boom which can only last as long the craft flies at exactly the speed of sound. This occurs for just a moment when accelerating above the speed of sound and decelerating below it. Traveling at higher speeds is still very loud but it does no more boom. This is why it is very difficult for pilots to create a sonic boom at the right spot when they fly by.
There is no continous sonic boom when the plane is super sonic as far as I know. I may be wrong though. I'm not quite sure what the sound does after it is compressed to the max. It might stay superimposed or is simply not traveling infront of the vehicle anymore just behind. I guess it depends on where it is created. It must also be created right at the front where the air is compressed so I guess I'm just wrong :-) I'll dig that later.
GermanRider You got it wrong. Any aircraft flying at or above the speed of sound will continuously generate a shockwave that will be perceived as a sonic boom by people on the ground once the shockwave passes by them. Think of it as a bow wave generated by a boat that travels parallel to a beach. Different people at the beach will be hit by the wave at different times, as the boat drives along. Same thing happens with the shock wave. The difference between flying at exactly M1 or above is that when the speed is equal to M1 the shock wave is a plane that is orthogonal to the direction of flight. As speed increases past M1, the shockwave becomes conical, with the cone angle increasing with speed above M1. In either case (speed=M1 or speed > M1), as the shockwave meets people on the ground along the flight path, they will hear the sonic boom, so different people will hear the boom at different times depending on their location below the flight path. This is well known for many decades, a good read on the subject should clear it up.
Man I'll miss hearing the twin sonic booms everyday it came in. It'd shake the house even in Orlando. Sucks, I hate not being to go in my backyard and not see the shuttle go off. :\
Miss hearing these. Used to hear these in Southern California when I was a kid In the 80s when they would land at Edwards AFB
Truly an amazing era of space exploration during the shuttle program. I hope SpaceX can come up with another amazing era. Kind of sad where we are presently.
Element of Kindness Now American astronauts go to Russia to continue to get to space
Great video! Your commentary makes it even more interesting. Thanks!
300 mph landing of the most complicated machine.amazing every time.
The Sonic BOOM!!!! is awesome it woke me up once out of deep sleep.It was the first time I ever heard it, just amazing.
Great video. It is amazing to see it so far up, falling back to Earth with it's nose still up.
soooooooooo nice!!!!! thanks for the commentary!
this is great! Thanks for putting it on here.
kq4ym, thanks for posting this video. "2012failure", it's not a hologram. It's actual video used from a guided camera and not IR, just a filter. (NASA) I've been watching shuttle landings since the 80's @ Edwards AFB. an awesome thing to experience out there. it didn't only rattle windows, it broke them...along with SR-71 flights 50 feet off the deck and haulin' the mail, amongst a few others seen there.
+Don Browne thanks these videos are great
manns101101 You are welcome! Glad you enjoyed it!
What's cool is to here the boom 5 minutes after it went by. If you're bored, calculate the distance. An amazing thing!
Nice film! ;) My fav though is sts 1 when John Young landed Columbia on runway 23 at Edwards 14 april 1981.
That is my life time memory.
All of you are partially correct. For most of the reentry, the computers are in control, but when, the speed and altitude are low enough, most shuttle commanders take over with manual control. The switch between commander and pilot (commander = pilot, pilot = copilot, if you will) while flying the HAC (heading alignment cone). So yes, the stick is passed back and forth during landing, but the commander always lands, the pilot just gets 20 seconds during decent.
It's amazing how shuttles literally just glide in
@kq4ym the shockwave in the front travels faster than the one in the back, thus with more distance to the source the shocks will travel apart. i dont think the lenght of the vehile does matter that much. special about the shuttle booms is the distance you can hear it from, so they sound more apart than from other (lower flying) aircraft.
Great video... An amazing machine... We''ll miss you guys... Now it's on to more advanced ships....
@kq4ym Assuming the shuttle was at 80,000 ft at the start of the video, it lands at 6:50. 80,000 / 6.50 = 12,307 ft per minute of descent.
Plus there's an echo in the background if you turn up your volume.
@kq4ym
A sonic boom is created at the front and at the tail of an aircraft.
The length of the space shuttle adds a delay between the two compared to a small
fighter jet.
Thank you Mr. Browne awesome video.
Once out in Oregon's back country while camping I woke to piss, flipped up the canopy door, I let down the tail gate, stood up to piss at around 3:30 in the a.m. while raining out at the time I heard this loud loud tremendous noise from all around and thought "Damn what the hell was that as I was ducking back in closing tailgate and canopy door. I covered back up and then on battery operated boombox, the one raidio station DJ came on and said Hey if you were up and about within the last few minutes or so, there was a loud sonic boom in our night sky as a space shuttle was descending into California for a nightime landing. That was some pretty cool news.
Great commentary Don ! Cheers
You seem to be wrong too. That indicates that there is 5,000 feet left of runway. In fact, If it had been a runway label, it would be red. In fact, the runway the shuttle landed on was runway 15, with a magnetic bearing of 155, and a length of 15,001 feet. This means that the shuttle used up approximately 10,500 feet of runway.
Question about twin sonic booms: Why are they, say a half second apart? I understand the cause of the two booms, but the source of those two booms would be a fraction of a second apart relative to a fixed point on the ground, since the vehicle is still supersonic. Anyone got a valid explanation?
Yes, the last 5 minutes are actually flown by the CMDR. Nothing is actually handed over. The CMDR & PLT stations are identical.
The computers generally controlled the flights from the time the shuttle launched until final approach. Then in the final few thousand feet or so the control is handed over to the pilot.
awesome job on the commentary!
Actually he is correct. the shuttle was indeed moving at Subsonic speeds when you hear the booms at 3:19. that was the boom as the Shuttle traveled at Mach 1. and as it dropped to Mach 0.99. You only hear the Sonic boom as a vehicle passes Mach 1. any speed after that you will no longer hear it. Notice around 2:50 it sound silent until the Shuttle reaches Mach 1 or the speed of sound around 3:15. as just before it becomes subsonic it creates it's Sonic boom
@StanleyKu at 1:50, the HUD says 63,000 ft, so I'm assuming that they were around 80,000 ft or so at the start of the video.
the first one at 0:22 was the reenter procedure in the atmosphere.this happens with every shuttle and this is the point where columbia broke up cause the heat is around 3100 c and it is enough to melt the material it was made it and thus it broke up.
the second one near 3:20 was like someone dabbing a microphone
Thanks, man. And hey, it's never too late!
@1Gaumer There generally is more than one boom, this is due to parts of the craft moving faster than the rest. Alot of the time the craft is too small to distinguish more than one boom. as kq4ym says the shuttle is alot larger so two are heard.
The reason they say this is because the CMDR always gives the PLT 10 to 30 seconds of actual flying time during the landing phase. Most of the pilots are first time flyers who never get actual flying time until their first flight. All of it is done on simulators. So this gives them a window to fly in before the CMDR does the actual landing.
for gods sake, why there's no footage of the inside of a cabin, the overview, of the actual controlling process from the cabin?
@Italoenigma your are somewhat correct , but its because it brakes the sound barrier. hope that helped
@kq4ym Yes, all jet planes make two booms, but when it shorter than space shuttle ,you can hear it like one boom. Sorry my english :-)
Many of the manuevers done on orbit are done manually. On landing, control is taken by the CMDR about 4.5 minutes prior to landing at about 50,000ft.
I once thought I could go on a space mission just for fun, I was a kid then, I still do.
If only we could
There is a lot of things that are done manually during landings. The gear is dropped by the pilot when they reach a certain air speed. The computer is not involved. The chute is deployed manually, the air speed indicators deployed, computer program imputs, deactivate reaction control jets, turn off heater systems, control speed brake. I could go on and on. The last five minutes are flown by the CMDR.
I used to live in Naples. And the first time it came over west Florida, it woke me up mid-morning, I thought the Condo exploded.
The two booms have absolutely zero to do with the size of the craft. ANY aircraft breaking the sound barrier will cause two booms. We normally don't hear them separately because the two are in such close succession (aka the aircraft is too close, they sound like one boom)
Since the shuttle is so far away the two booms have time to separate, giving us the two booms.
The shuttle is a beautiful spacecraft. Makes me tear up. :')
Yes, it certainly is!
To get to the Space Station, you do have to fly over Great Britain! Don't worry, though. They had altered their launch trajectory many years ago to drop the tank in the Pacific Ocean. If you hear them say after MECO (Main Engine Cut-Off), "OMS-1 not required" then they are on a path to put the tank in the Pacific, not the Indian Ocean.
I heard one of these once when I was down in Orange County.
i heard 1, if you have a water tower or some kind of tall structure in about 1 mile away you will get an echo
@amgen52 Yes one part is moving faster than the other. And the rest of what you said is just what I said. The shuttle is larger so two are heard more prominently. but not always two booms are created. As some craft are slower at reaching the barrier than others it sometimes creeps to the barrier then slows down therefore only creating one boom as after breaching the barrier forces change drastically.
how did it go sonic if the HUD has 200/300 kts on the left side? :s
Exactly my friend. The only engines they have are used for ascending and a lil boost.
Great video and thanks for the commentary. Where were you shooting from and how did you have the audio from the shuttle and command center? It was amazing to watch Discovery glide down for a perfect landing! Oh~ the front landing gear sure looks small compared to the size of the shuttle!! Thanks again, Don.
@largferg Discovery did not get destroyed. We lost Challenger on 1/28/1986 and Columbia on 2/1/2003. Discovery is slated to launch for the last time in February 2011.
Further expand the global City in space?
i seen it live on tv thank for the post
Thanks for the nice comment Adam!
@MovieMad007 Can't be true. The SRBs separate 70-some seconds after lift off getting it to just over 150,000ft. You can see them separate with the naked eye standing on the ground in Florida. I know, I've seen it. That happens about 20-30 miles into the flight. The SRBs are towed back to KSC by boat.
Great video! Any idea of the altitude when the video first started? 50,000 ft maybe?
@kq4ym there are certain flight paths that are allowed for military aircraft over US land... I used to live near one. Kinda fun except when things would fall off the walls and all
Yes but why is there only a sonic boom during re entry?
Whenever the speed of sound is exceeded in the earth's atmosphere, it will make a sonic boom heard on the ground below the flight path.
Re-entry has nothing to do with the sonic boom. When the orbiter goes below Mach 1 at about 50,000 feet you hear the sonic boom because the shock wave is traveling up and down. At launch when the orbiter travels vertical and breaks the sound barrier , the shock wave travels horizontal to the ground and never gets to the ground.
@@jrockett73 , It never breaks the sound barrier at launch dude. My gf lived in Cocoa Beach is what you need to know. No sonic boom.at launch. I've heard too many F-16 break the sound barrier to know what it sounds like. Nothing like any launch I've ever heard. By the way at re entry it has nothing to do with which direction the sound is traveling. Either you break the sound barrier or you dont. This is not debatable. Like I said I've heard F-16 traveling parallel to the ground while breaking the sound barrier. Not a good explanation at all dude.
You don't understand. The shuttle most certainly does break the sound barrier during launch. It goes from zero to 17,500mph to orbit the earth. It breaks the sound barrier in less than a minute. At launch the shock wave travels horizontal and never reaches the ground. Thats why you never hear a missile break the sound barrier either. An F-16 like the shuttle during landing either breaks the barrier accelerating above 750 or breaks it decelerating below 750. The key is that the shock wave travels vertical and hits the ground. This isn't my theory but basic physics. There are many videos that even show the orbiter breaking the sound barrier during launch. You can see it but can't hear it. Look it up...
@@jrockett73 , Oh I understand. I go by what I hear and see.
One day this will be ancient history that kids will be learning in school.
Thanks for sharing this video, and the information you share.
My kids and I visit Kennedy Space center/ NASA in oct 2009, what an experience!
I was wondering, is there any engines running when it deorbit, or is it just gliding home?
@kq4ym i hate to be a stickler but the speed of sound is 694mph above 20,000 feet and 736mph at sea level :)
@Italoenigma I was at the first three shuttle landings at Edwards AFB.... and the 26th. You are loooookin' and looooookin' wondering where it is in the sky. Then... BOOM!!! BOOM!!! About 1/8 second apart. The crowd cheers and there she is... A bright white dot in the insanely blue California sky.
I remember in 2009 getting to hear firsthand what a space shuttle sonic boom sounded like i was expecting it but it still made me jump out of my skin it was quite loud
@kq4ym
Just so ya know, there are specific places over land military jets can break the sound barrier. There are restricted areas and ranges as well as regular routes over fairly populated areas with the caveat that it must be done very high, i.e. above FL300. :-D
Came here to listen sonic boom then i m stunned with the beauty of space shuttles fly footage.. this is like a big white whale swimming in a crystal clear ocean.
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labelle proves how far away those booms travel.(love labelle also.tons of oaks/bromiliads/nice town/great pie resturant
I don't understand why you said that there was two sonic booms, one almost at the beginning of the video 0:22 and the other one almost in the middle 3:19. The sonic boom is because the shuttle is entering into the atmosphere right?
@Italoenigma i think the sonic boom is because the space shuttle is crossing the sound barrier
Aircraft/Spacecraft also cause sonic booms when slowing down "back through" the sound barrier-not just accelerating through it.
Last year two F-22 Raptors broke the sound barrier over Las Cruces NM near Holloman Air Force Base.
First a few seconds... how high it was ? 30 km ? if yes good camera zoom
Well that's probably a 240p recording.
Is the space shuttle gliding or is it using its engines?
I was younger than 13 (but at age 11) and I was playing my eletronic piano in my room with my door shut and all of a sudden (BOOM) it made me jump high and the boom shook my house. :O
About 2 years back this was....
Thanks all for passing 303,000 views this week of my RUclips space shuttle sonic boom video:
ruclips.net/video/MbfH5pOsOVA/видео.html
@kq4ym Up no. The space shuttle decends at over 10,000ft a minute. If it was at 36,000ft it would hit the ground like 30 miles short of the runway. 20 degree glideslope vs 3 degrees for an airliner.
beautiful
THE SPEED OF SOUND IS CLOSER TO 750 MPH. LOOK IT UP.
I would be inclined to agree with you on the sonic booms. You hear them because the plane IS going super sonic. If it turns and is going super sonic the sonic boom will continue the same direction and you will hear it. but you are hearing it because it turned not because it is subsonic.
While it makes sense to say that when you hear the booms when it is sub sonic I really would be curious exactly when the shuttle goes subsonic in the turn and when you hear the booms.
What a pilot though, wow.
Let me get this right. Did you say this was being filmed by your video camera as it passed over YOUR house? If that is so.....how come the video coverage (at the part you claim to be filming) says NASA on it?Hmmmm????
I used to live in Florida, and one day I heard an absolutely DEAFENING noise, almost enough to get me on the ground in pain. Not until recently did I realize it was a sonic boom, though I'm not sure if it was from a Space shuttle, or fighter jet, or what.
+DeltaNoodles If you live in Florida, learn to expect sonic booms and other areal phenomena. Your living near a space port.
I use to hear the shuttle all the time, it would shake my house. I wish Obama wouldn't have ended out space program. The shuttle was so cool.
By any chance were you on the north side of North Hutchinson Island or the surrounding area? That's basically across one of the Indian River inlets from Kennedy Space Center.
Local speed of sound (LSS) is only and exclusively related with temperature not size of aircraft or so... speed of sound could happen as speed increases or decreases, not necessarily when only increases.. incorrect information given by the guy who is making comments
Someone explain to me why one pilot gives up the controls to another pilot? Is one better at turning the craft and aligning it or sumin? Wouldn't it be better if they had just 1 bad ass pilot that could do it all so you wouldn't havta switch?
Two pilots are common in most flight situations in complex aircraft. This allows duties to be split, and a co-pilot also can serve to make sure all procedures are carried out correctly as an additional safety check. :Piloting a space shuttle is not quite the same as driving a car to the grocery store and back. Any additional help in piloting adds to the safety and efficiency of the trip.
There is a Pilot, and then there is a Shuttle Commander. The Commander always lands the bird.
your banging a drum a sound barrier sounds totally different and even on tv
why 2 booms ?
The best machine ever made by mankind