Gurdaspur: ‘Sonic boom’ sends policemen in a tizzy
Ravi Dhaliwal
Gurdaspur, May 16
A blast-type sound emanating from the vicinity of the heavily populated Tibri cantonment this afternoon put the police on high alert. The sound could be heard 8 km away till Gurdaspur city. The police cordoned off the entire area falling in a 10 km radius of the military station.
Rarely heard
Such booms are rarely heard in this area. However, Tuesday’s sound was from a sonic boom. An officer
“The noise rattled the windowpanes of my shop,” said Tarsem Chand, a trader whose shop is located right in front of the main gate of the cantonment.
Around 1 pm, a window-shattering sound was reported from Tibri. Around 30 minutes later, all DSPs and SHOs of the district were asked to reach the spot. Dog squads were also pressed into service. The police immediately got in touch with their Army counterparts and a massive search operation was launched.
SSP Harish Dayama, who led the combing operations said in all probability, the sound originated from a fighter aircraft. “Although investigations are in progress, in all probability, it appears that it was a sonic boom,” he said.
A sonic boom is a sound associated with shock waves created when an object, or a fighter plane, travels through the air faster than the speed of light. Such booms generate enormous amounts of sound energy, sounding similar to an explosion to the human ear.
The last time the sound of fighter aircraft cutting through the air in Gurdaspur were heard was in the wee hours of February 26, 2019, when the Balakot strike took place. “Such booms are rarely heard in this area. However, today’s sound was from a sonic boom,” said an officer.
