Sonic boom from F-15 rattles central Illinois communities
Dec 21, 2021, 11:53 AM | Updated: 1:16 pm
SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (AP) — An F-15 fighter jet traveling over central Illinois created a sonic boom that rattled the region Tuesday, prompting concerned residents to flood local police stations with calls about the noise, a state agency said.
The Illinois Emergency Management Agency said in a statement that the department was alerted about 11:20 CST about “a large noise and shaking felt by many residents” across central Illinois.
The state agency said it began investigating with federal, state and local officials and found that the sound was a sonic boom created by a military fighter jet.
“It was determined that an F-15 fighter jet in the airspace above central Illinois course corrected creating a sonic boom. When the aircraft broke the sound barrier, the pressure wave created an audible noise and minor shaking in the region,” the state agency said in a statement.
There have been no reports of damage caused by the noise, it added.
The emergency agency’s spokeswoman, Rebecca Clark, referred questions about the origin of the F-15 fighter jet to the Federal Aviation Administration’s Kansas City office. The Associated Press emailed the FAA’s media relations office asking about the fighter jet’s point of origin and for information on the type of maneuvers it was performing at the time.
Decatur Fire Department’s Deputy Chief Dan Kline told the Herald & Review that the noise prompted concerned calls to Decatur’s police and fire departments.
“I went up on the roof of Station One after we heard it and looked around but didn’t see any smoke or anything,” Kline said. He said the noise was so loud that he thought “someone had dropped something heavy upstairs” in the fire department building.
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