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The snow crunch
I was walking in snowy Manchester yesterday and was astonished by how loud the crunching underfoot was. The snow has been on the ground for a couple of days, and the compacted snow on the pavements seems to have reached the optimal consistency for making loud crunching sounds. Why does snow make a crunching sound…
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Igloo acoustics
Manchester has completely ground to a halt with heavy snowfall. Yesterday, my children and their friends built an impressive igloo from compacted snow bricks. I crawled into it this morning and was struck by the sound of my voice inside. Normally in a small room your voice gets enhanced by the sound bouncing around the…
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Quietest day of the decade
Around the world, tranquility is gradually disappearing as man-made sounds, especially noise from planes and cars, increasingly encroach on quiet places. There’s a lot of interest in tranquility at the moment from campaign groups, governments and researchers (e.g. [1]). The fear is that unless we identify tranquil places and try to preserve them, they will…