Earthquakes, mining operations officially ruled out as cause of Bundaberg ‘booms’

Weird, irregular ‘sonic booms’ that have been plaguing and perplexing the residents of Bundaberg for the past six months also have authorities guessing. But some possible explanations have been put forward.

Loud, distant “boom” sounds have been heard frequently across the Bundaberg region over the past six months, forcing local residents to seek answers on social media.

Facebook users have offered up several theories, including “bad repelling” and “car backfires”, but these met with little agreement.

Movements at local quarries have also been ruled out, while a spokesperson for Evolution Mining at Mt Rawdon, 20km west of Mt Perry, ruled out mining operations as the cause of the midnight sounds.

“Nothing [is done] at nightime,” they said. “Our blasts here are about 2pm of an afternoon.

“It’s just usual truck operations at nighttime so there’d be no bangs or booms or anything like that.”

Experts at the Bureau of Meteorology responded to the NewsMail, saying they can’t explain the sound.

“Our meteorologists cannot find any weather phenomena that could be attributed to this sound,” they said.

Meanwhile, Bundaberg Regional Council said “they are not aware of this being a Council matter.”

Seismology Research Centre Australia chief scientist Adam Pascale said earthquakes in the region could also be ruled out.

“Anything that was large enough to be felt would be picked up by the seismographs we’ve got in that region,” he said.

“In Bundaberg itself, there hasn’t been a lot of earthquakes in the town area. Most of them have been off to the south-west at Mt Perry. There has been a number of sequences over the years with big quakes but they haven’t happened for a few years.

“Most of the other ones have been off the coast probably about 50km off the coast.

“I don’t think these sounds are being generated by earth movement, I could probably rule out earthquake being a source.

“I think it’s more likely to be an atmospheric pressure wave.”

A more likely cause could be an atmospheric phenomena known as “skyquakes” recently studied by researchers for the Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysical Agency in Indonesia.

Skyquakes are enigmatic sounds that have been described as “an explosive boom rumbling in the distance” and have been reported all around the world, including in Australia.

The research paper, titled Skyquakes phenomenon analysis using geophysical approach in Java Island seeks to understand the phenomena.

“Based on the results of previous studies and reports, this skyquake phenomenon has occurred in several countries, including the Ganges river in India, the East Coast and Finger Lake of the United States, the North Sea of Japan, the Bay of Fundy in Canada, and parts of Australia, Belgium, Scotland, Italy and Ireland,” the paper reads.

“The skyquake phenomenon is an event that needs to be studied based on the causes of the incident. Most scientists propose another possible explanation for this phenomenon, the cause of the skyquakes may be a sonic boom from a meteor or military aircraft.”

The paper further explains that coronal mass ejections or accelerating particles from the earth’s magnetic field could also explain the phenomena.

In December 2020, scientists from the University of Carolina in the US gave a presentation on data collected from 400 atmospheric sensors and seismographs to the American Geographysical Union after hearing news reports on the phenomena.

“We believe this is an atmospheric phenomenon,” researcher Eli Bird said.

“We don‘t think it’s coming from seismic activity, we’re assuming it’s propagating through the atmosphere rather than the ground.”

Bundaberg residents said other scientific explanations for the mysterious booms could include military planes breaking the sound barrier, meteors exploding high up in the atmosphere or expulsions of gas from deep inside the earth, while more supernatural explanations such as alien craft have been blamed.