By looking at the wake of a boat it helps you understand how sonic booms occur. If you toss a pebble in a pond, little waves will form in concentric circles and move away from the point of impact. If a boat travels through the pond at 5 to 8 kilometers per hour, little waves will move away in the same way both ahead of and behind the boat, and the boat will travel through them. If …showed first 75 words of 546 total…

…showed last 75 words of 546 total…dramatically. A plane traveling at 30,000 feet in the air must travel much faster than a plane traveling at sea level to create a sonic boom. The lower the plane the slower it needs to go to travel faster than the speed of sound. Bibliography www.phy.ntnu.edu.tw/java/airplane/airplane.htm http://history.nasa.gov/SP-4219/Chapter3.html http://oea.larc.nasa.gov/news_rels/2000/00-008.html Encarta 1999 encyclopedia World book 2000 Word Count: 520