What is the loudest sound you have ever heard?

[TheTecknician]

Both of mine were at very close quarters. One was a foghorn on a cross-channel ferry. It sounded whilst I, unbeknownst to me, was sitting right underneath it. I jumped so far it's a wonder I didn't end up in the sea! The other was one afternoon at work, standing underneath Concorde when it was starting two of its four engines. It was the most incredible, deep-chested roar I've ever heard. Yet to be surpassed.

F1 cars at the British Grand Prix under a covered grandstand, before they made the engines quieter. Had no idea they would be that loud.
Interestingly I read something about before the industrial revolution, the loudest sound anyone would ever hear was the church bells. Makes you think how noisy modern life is, even if you live in a quiet place.

😁😁😁 You lucky thing!

Sneezes can be absurdly loud - my late parents were experts. We used to joke about earthquakes starting when Mum sneezed. An old colleague from decades ago had a very loud sneeze and it always happened without warning in a quiet open-plan office. It would make everybody jump!

I was just talking to dh about this thread - he experienced a Vulcan doing a full power near vertical takeoff (he was on the ground!) … utterly mind blowing.

My dad was an aerospace engineer, he’s got a whole repertoire of rocket engine stories 😂

If they’re low enough they can actually burst everyone’s ear drums!!

The noise of the rails on the Northern line heading towards Kings Cross. It is painful.

A farmer who lived about 1/4 mile away who made his own home made fireworks. Honestly the house shook. People in a village 2 miles away called the police.

Tie between a gunshot and how I used to be basically on top of the speakers at rock shows in my younger years. I considered it a fair trade for being close to the stage. I actually have minor hearing loss in one ear now and I think that might be why 😳

Hello local mumsetter 😀

I saw Swans live a few times in the 1980s. They were nauseatingly loud and it would take several days for my hearing to return to normal after seeing them.

Military jets when we were living in the Middle East. We lived quite close to a base from which (I was told) they were practising ‘bumps and starts’. They came so close overhead, it was deafening. I well remember a very little dd2 who’d been playing quietly outside, rushing in, terrified.

A bit earlier, different (desert) ME location, Concorde used to do its sonic boom very close overhead. The windows of our prefab used to rattle! At only about 15 months, dd1’s very first words apart from Mummy/Dada, were ‘Goggok BANG!’

It was an IRA bomb on the city of London, in about 1993? I was about a mile away, and also saw a massive mushroom cloud as I was in a tall tower block. Even that wasn't as loud as I'd expect a bomb to sound.

A lion roaring about a metre away from me in New Zealand. Unfathomably loud and rattly.

The MGM lion(s) most likely didn't need amplification.

There's no racket like a jet engine, especially a good old-fashioned turbo jet, when it's really going for broke.

Whilst on holiday in France, an explosion in a house across the road which totally flattened the 5 houses around it.

We were sitting by the pool and trying to work out what the hell had happened.

The sound system in Berghain club in Berlin followed closely by my mum shouting me in for a Sunday night bath.

Deep Purple, when I was near the speakers.
(I am one of the foolish boomers with hearing loss from many concerts.)

A bomb at a police station close to my primary school. The blast seemed to last for ages. Like slow motion. Our classroom faced onto the main road and we were so close we saw the debris flying into the air and heard it landing on the ground.

And another bomb in Belfast city centre near our office building. We were evacuated before it went off, but that meant most of us were outside when it went off and the noise was horrendous. A few people, whose exit was closer to the centre of the explosion, ended up with perforated ear drums.

A lion roaring it was terrifying and goes right through you and that was in a wildlife park

also a cracking sound from earth tremors (was like an earthquake as so strong) it was a terrifying noise

Mine is The Swans too. ?’87/88 at the Mermaid in Birmingham. I was outside and it was still too loud.

The Vulcan or The Typhoon probably.

DD screaming. Makes my ears ring.

Thin Lizzy, St.George's Hall Bradford, sometime in 1977. It was physically painful for me, and I had to leave after half an hour or so.

A Harrier jet which made an emergency landing at Leeds/Bradford airport, probably in the early 80s. It was mind-bogglingly loud - I can't imagine what it must have been like on the deck of an aircraft carrier with those taking off, even with ear protection.

fighter jet landed about half a mile from my window across landing in the sun every morning and ended at 5pm the fence was so high the landing gear touched the top of the fence i could read the tail numbers

Aston Martin Valkyrie being fired up. People were coming from other buildings to watch once they heard the roar.