7 ms·

Have you heard 'the hum'? Mystery of Earth's low droning noise solved?

84 points by chippy 12y ago

cshimmin 12y ago
It's not clear from the article, and I'm curious as to why it took them so long to figure out? Seismographs (which, as I understand, are able to "hear" the hum as well) are not a new technology.
- krischer 12y ago
  The newspaper article (not the journal one) got essentially everything wrong...the journal article does not talk about this hum people claim to hear at all. The paper describes a model for seismic noise generated at periods between 3 and 300 seconds (not Hz!) and I strongly doubt any human can hear that (frequency AND amplitude wise). Seismometers did indeed record the noise for quite a while but it was mostly considered an annoyance. Now in the last decade or so we learned that we can extract useful information from the noise and this caused all kinds of new studies, some (like this one here) focused on determining the regions and mechanisms of the origin of the noise in the seismic wavefield.
thyrsus 12y ago
Does someone know it's usual frequency? When it's quiet in my house there's a hum at around 50hz, but its very constant - no 13 to 300 seconds, it's always there. I first assumed it was someone in the neighborhood running a motor, or maybe the water plant a couple miles away, but when it was particularly noticeable during a widespread blackout here (in part, due to the quiet - and eliminating the likelihood of an electric power effect), my next ideas were a resonance from traffic on the interstate a couple miles away, or maybe someone even further doing some drilling (there's been discussion of fracking starting soon a dozen miles away or so, but it's not supposed to be happening yet, and I first noticed several years ago).
- krischer 12y ago
  50 Hz is very characteristic for a power line close by but as you already ruled that out I have no clue. Nonetheless much to high for any seismic noise.
  - CompuHacker 12y ago
    He's in the US, which rules out 50Hz at any precision. He needs to take measurements.
    - Someone 12y ago
      On the other hand, without measurements, 60 Hz may be close enough to 50 Hz to include it in "around 50 Hz", depending on the OP's ability to estimate sound frequencies. But yes, measurements are the way to go.
    - thyrsus 12y ago
      On a piano, it's closest to the C three octaves below middle C, so around 33Hz. I regret my lack of perfect pitch.
- genericuser 12y ago
  Keep in mind the black out wouldn't rule out any electric device that had batteries or capacitors as part of it. I had a smoke detector that made a slight humming, took me forever to figure out where it was coming from, and replace that smoke detector.
  - na85 12y ago
    Battery-powered smoke detectors will likely be running on DC so coil hum seems unlikely.
    - bronson 12y ago
      Unless it has a switching converter or regulator. Even when running at high frequencies they'll often generate harmonics in the audible range. It can take a heck of a lot of effort to keep a circuit quiet and nonmicrophonic.
__david__ 12y ago
There was a house I lived in at the edge of town, and late at night on the balcony (midnight, 1 am, etc) when it was very quiet I could hear really quiet booming sounds. It was quiet enough that if a car drove by on the nearest road it would drown out the sound. It was not a steady hum—more like a distant explosion or bass drum. It was frequent but not regular enough to be music. I would guess it was the 20 to 30hz range. I could never quite figure out what it was.
- exogen 12y ago
  During a cross country bicycle trip my partner and I were camping just outside a tiny town in the middle of Colorado. I had trouble sleeping and kept getting out of the tent to look around due to what sounded like a large flag blowing in the wind, or a rabbit thumping its foot against the ground. Low, faint, slightly irregular. But there was nothing around. Lasted all night and morning. It was driving me nuts!
- dholowiski 12y ago
  Exact same story here. I wonder if it was this.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- panglott 12y ago
  Maybe something like this? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acoustic_shadow#Long_distance_acoustic_shadow https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acoustic_shadow#Long_distance_...
Apocryphon 12y ago
My main takeaway from this is that when there's very strange unexplainable sounds on the Earth, the most likely culprit may be the Earth itself. Also see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloop https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloop
- cpncrunch 12y ago
  Nope. There is no evidence that people are actually hearing the hum described in the paper. In fact it's highly unlikely. Is there any evidence at all that the human ear can detect 0.1Hz?
  - swamp40 12y ago
    I don't think it would come in thru your ear. Maybe resonating inside your body cavity?
    - derefr 12y ago
      I probably just don't know enough about acoustics, but could vibrations with a subsonic period travelling through the earth cause resonations in smaller air-filled cavities (e.g. underground air pockets/caves; the insides of buildings; bodies of water) that would then result in audible vibrations?
      - swamp40 12y ago
        Yes, there have been instances of subsonic standing waves/resonance in hallways that have caused feelings of fear and reports of "ghost" sightings.
    - cpncrunch 12y ago
      That's really just speculation, and it wouldn't likely sound like a "hum". Tinnitus and/or mains hum seems a much more likely explanation.
slashnull 12y ago
It's no fair, I have none of "the hum" here so I have to play my own drone on my speakers and I'm running out of bands. Either way I'm pretty sure the entire phenomenon is just SunnO))) recording albums.
bulletsvshumans 12y ago
Quote that explains their finding: "Researchers claim that microseismic activity from long ocean waves impacting the sea bed is what makes our planet vibrate and produces the droning sound. The pressure of the waves on the seafloor generates seismic waves that cause the Earth to oscillate. [...] The continuous waves produce sounds lasting from 13 to 300 seconds. They can be heard by a relatively small proportion of people – who are sensitive to the hums – and also by seismic instruments."
slashnull 12y ago
Actually it's probably Fraa Jad or some other Millenarian signing.
headShrinker 12y ago
I have heard 'the hum'. In my house in western Connecticut, at night when nothing else is on, everything is quiet. I'm far from the ocean. There is no industry near by. No trucks. Nothing. There is a hum... maybe about 40 - 70Hz. It's creepy the first time you hear it. It seemed to be coming from the ground, and the walls. I moved to the bedroom it was there too. It's very quiet. You can't hear it if anything else is on. If you say this to people they think you are crazy. I've had my ears checked for other reasons and they are fine. I'm not on any medications, or anything like that. The hum is not ocean wave vibration forces. The hum is constant and consistent. It sounds of mechanical precision. I have little doubt the sound is from a man made object. From Wikipedia: "The Hum" History There has been little mainstream attention. Only a handful of articles have been published in scientific literature, including: Leventhall, 2004,[15] 2003;[8] Cowan, 2003;[16] Mullins & Kelly, 1998, 1995;[4] Broner, 1978;[17] Vasudevan & Gordon, 1977.[18] Others publications include: Frosch, 2013,[19] Deming, 2004;[20] Fox, 1989;[21] Wilson, 1979;[5] Hanlon, 1973.[22] The Hum has been repo rted worldwide.[12] The World Hum Database and Mapping Project was launched in December 2012, in order to build detailed mappings of hum locations and to provide a database of Hum-related data for professional and independent researchers.[23] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hum http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hum
- creshal 12y ago
  > There is a hum... maybe about 40 - 70Hz. I've always assumed it was coming from the power grid – it's the same frequency range, and gods know what metallic stuff in the walls could vibrate in resonance to it.
- foobarge 12y ago
  I hear the hum as well sometimes, in different locations (my home office, separate from the house - here I can hear it during the day) or in the house, at night. When heard, if I move my head a little bit, the sounds goes away and usually comes back a second later. I thought this was a nearby engine/motor (there are a lot of houses with installed heat pumps in the neighborhood), but as I've read the Wikipedia article, my money is now on tinnitus. I've been running a FFY analyzer when I hear it and it's never been able to pick anything up actually airborne, nor any vibration through anything solid that would be picked up by a microphone.
aaron695 12y ago
I'm pretty sure this is what it's always been thought to have been, assuming it exists? This was the theory from forever ago. Unless it's been conclusively proven or the wave type is different. More newspaper science I guess.
ronnier 12y ago
This hum terrorized me for months in Kirkland, WA. I falsely accused my neighbors over it -- they were completely innocent. Ended up moving a few miles away and haven't heard it since.
chippy 12y ago
I've been hearing it, at varying volumes from time to time. I also describe it as someone leaving a car running a few houses way. Going outside with the sound of the wind, and faraway cars makes it harder to detect. Once I walked a miles radius at 5am in the summer trying to find where it is from. I assumed it was an all night nightclub. The hum was beat like, like the bass line from some fast dance music. But I've also heard it during the afternoon at home. Sometimes I thought I could hear higher pitched drum beat instead of a hum. I've heard this in two locations. Usually indoors is where it seems the loudest. I like the idea about sea waves, but I think it could be more mechanical in nature. Perhaps radio waves interacting with quartz crystals in bricks, cement or (around here) limestone blocks. Note, I think this "hum" could be different or the same as the Hummadruz which has been recorded for centuries and is like bees humming. See http://www.northernearth.co.uk/permhum.htm http://www.northernearth.co.uk/permhum.htm for some more info. "In 1878 R.E.Bibby, a local musician and composer, recalled from his 1820s childhood a low drone or humming noise heard in suburbs to the south and east of Manchester, especially Gorton, Rusholme and Longsight. It was heard on calm, clear days, usually in the early morning or at dusk. "

84 points by chippy 12y ago

It's not clear from the article, and I'm curious as to why it took them so long to figure out? Seismographs (which, as I understand, are able to "hear" the hum as well) are not a new technology.

krischer 12y ago
The newspaper article (not the journal one) got essentially everything wrong...the journal article does not talk about this hum people claim to hear at all. The paper describes a model for seismic noise generated at periods between 3 and 300 seconds (not Hz!) and I strongly doubt any human can hear that (frequency AND amplitude wise). Seismometers did indeed record the noise for quite a while but it was mostly considered an annoyance. Now in the last decade or so we learned that we can extract useful information from the noise and this caused all kinds of new studies, some (like this one here) focused on determining the regions and mechanisms of the origin of the noise in the seismic wavefield.

thyrsus 12y ago

Does someone know it's usual frequency? When it's quiet in my house there's a hum at around 50hz, but its very constant - no 13 to 300 seconds, it's always there. I first assumed it was someone in the neighborhood running a motor, or maybe the water plant a couple miles away, but when it was particularly noticeable during a widespread blackout here (in part, due to the quiet - and eliminating the likelihood of an electric power effect), my next ideas were a resonance from traffic on the interstate a couple miles away, or maybe someone even further doing some drilling (there's been discussion of fracking starting soon a dozen miles away or so, but it's not supposed to be happening yet, and I first noticed several years ago).

krischer 12y ago
50 Hz is very characteristic for a power line close by but as you already ruled that out I have no clue. Nonetheless much to high for any seismic noise.
- CompuHacker 12y ago
  He's in the US, which rules out 50Hz at any precision. He needs to take measurements.
  - Someone 12y ago
    On the other hand, without measurements, 60 Hz may be close enough to 50 Hz to include it in "around 50 Hz", depending on the OP's ability to estimate sound frequencies. But yes, measurements are the way to go.
  - thyrsus 12y ago
    On a piano, it's closest to the C three octaves below middle C, so around 33Hz. I regret my lack of perfect pitch.
genericuser 12y ago
Keep in mind the black out wouldn't rule out any electric device that had batteries or capacitors as part of it. I had a smoke detector that made a slight humming, took me forever to figure out where it was coming from, and replace that smoke detector.
- na85 12y ago
  Battery-powered smoke detectors will likely be running on DC so coil hum seems unlikely.
  - bronson 12y ago
    Unless it has a switching converter or regulator. Even when running at high frequencies they'll often generate harmonics in the audible range. It can take a heck of a lot of effort to keep a circuit quiet and nonmicrophonic.

__david__ 12y ago

There was a house I lived in at the edge of town, and late at night on the balcony (midnight, 1 am, etc) when it was very quiet I could hear really quiet booming sounds. It was quiet enough that if a car drove by on the nearest road it would drown out the sound. It was not a steady hum—more like a distant explosion or bass drum. It was frequent but not regular enough to be music. I would guess it was the 20 to 30hz range. I could never quite figure out what it was.

exogen 12y ago
During a cross country bicycle trip my partner and I were camping just outside a tiny town in the middle of Colorado. I had trouble sleeping and kept getting out of the tent to look around due to what sounded like a large flag blowing in the wind, or a rabbit thumping its foot against the ground. Low, faint, slightly irregular. But there was nothing around. Lasted all night and morning. It was driving me nuts!
dholowiski 12y ago
Exact same story here. I wonder if it was this.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
panglott 12y ago
Maybe something like this? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acoustic_shadow#Long_distance_acoustic_shadow https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acoustic_shadow#Long_distance_...

Apocryphon 12y ago

My main takeaway from this is that when there's very strange unexplainable sounds on the Earth, the most likely culprit may be the Earth itself. Also see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloop https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloop

cpncrunch 12y ago
Nope. There is no evidence that people are actually hearing the hum described in the paper. In fact it's highly unlikely. Is there any evidence at all that the human ear can detect 0.1Hz?
- swamp40 12y ago
  I don't think it would come in thru your ear. Maybe resonating inside your body cavity?
  - derefr 12y ago
    I probably just don't know enough about acoustics, but could vibrations with a subsonic period travelling through the earth cause resonations in smaller air-filled cavities (e.g. underground air pockets/caves; the insides of buildings; bodies of water) that would then result in audible vibrations?
    - swamp40 12y ago
      Yes, there have been instances of subsonic standing waves/resonance in hallways that have caused feelings of fear and reports of "ghost" sightings.
  - cpncrunch 12y ago
    That's really just speculation, and it wouldn't likely sound like a "hum". Tinnitus and/or mains hum seems a much more likely explanation.

slashnull 12y ago

It's no fair, I have none of "the hum" here so I have to play my own drone on my speakers and I'm running out of bands. Either way I'm pretty sure the entire phenomenon is just SunnO))) recording albums.

bulletsvshumans 12y ago

Quote that explains their finding: "Researchers claim that microseismic activity from long ocean waves impacting the sea bed is what makes our planet vibrate and produces the droning sound. The pressure of the waves on the seafloor generates seismic waves that cause the Earth to oscillate. [...] The continuous waves produce sounds lasting from 13 to 300 seconds. They can be heard by a relatively small proportion of people – who are sensitive to the hums – and also by seismic instruments."

slashnull 12y ago

Actually it's probably Fraa Jad or some other Millenarian signing.

headShrinker 12y ago

I have heard 'the hum'. In my house in western Connecticut, at night when nothing else is on, everything is quiet. I'm far from the ocean. There is no industry near by. No trucks. Nothing. There is a hum... maybe about 40 - 70Hz. It's creepy the first time you hear it. It seemed to be coming from the ground, and the walls. I moved to the bedroom it was there too. It's very quiet. You can't hear it if anything else is on. If you say this to people they think you are crazy. I've had my ears checked for other reasons and they are fine. I'm not on any medications, or anything like that. The hum is not ocean wave vibration forces. The hum is constant and consistent. It sounds of mechanical precision. I have little doubt the sound is from a man made object. From Wikipedia: "The Hum" History There has been little mainstream attention. Only a handful of articles have been published in scientific literature, including: Leventhall, 2004,[15] 2003;[8] Cowan, 2003;[16] Mullins & Kelly, 1998, 1995;[4] Broner, 1978;[17] Vasudevan & Gordon, 1977.[18] Others publications include: Frosch, 2013,[19] Deming, 2004;[20] Fox, 1989;[21] Wilson, 1979;[5] Hanlon, 1973.[22] The Hum has been repo rted worldwide.[12] The World Hum Database and Mapping Project was launched in December 2012, in order to build detailed mappings of hum locations and to provide a database of Hum-related data for professional and independent researchers.[23] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hum http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hum

creshal 12y ago
> There is a hum... maybe about 40 - 70Hz. I've always assumed it was coming from the power grid – it's the same frequency range, and gods know what metallic stuff in the walls could vibrate in resonance to it.
foobarge 12y ago
I hear the hum as well sometimes, in different locations (my home office, separate from the house - here I can hear it during the day) or in the house, at night. When heard, if I move my head a little bit, the sounds goes away and usually comes back a second later. I thought this was a nearby engine/motor (there are a lot of houses with installed heat pumps in the neighborhood), but as I've read the Wikipedia article, my money is now on tinnitus. I've been running a FFY analyzer when I hear it and it's never been able to pick anything up actually airborne, nor any vibration through anything solid that would be picked up by a microphone.

aaron695 12y ago

I'm pretty sure this is what it's always been thought to have been, assuming it exists? This was the theory from forever ago. Unless it's been conclusively proven or the wave type is different. More newspaper science I guess.

ronnier 12y ago

This hum terrorized me for months in Kirkland, WA. I falsely accused my neighbors over it -- they were completely innocent. Ended up moving a few miles away and haven't heard it since.

chippy 12y ago

I've been hearing it, at varying volumes from time to time. I also describe it as someone leaving a car running a few houses way. Going outside with the sound of the wind, and faraway cars makes it harder to detect. Once I walked a miles radius at 5am in the summer trying to find where it is from. I assumed it was an all night nightclub. The hum was beat like, like the bass line from some fast dance music. But I've also heard it during the afternoon at home. Sometimes I thought I could hear higher pitched drum beat instead of a hum. I've heard this in two locations. Usually indoors is where it seems the loudest. I like the idea about sea waves, but I think it could be more mechanical in nature. Perhaps radio waves interacting with quartz crystals in bricks, cement or (around here) limestone blocks. Note, I think this "hum" could be different or the same as the Hummadruz which has been recorded for centuries and is like bees humming. See http://www.northernearth.co.uk/permhum.htm http://www.northernearth.co.uk/permhum.htm for some more info. "In 1878 R.E.Bibby, a local musician and composer, recalled from his 1820s childhood a low drone or humming noise heard in suburbs to the south and east of Manchester, especially Gorton, Rusholme and Longsight. It was heard on calm, clear days, usually in the early morning or at dusk. "