Hemel Explosion

[Drusilla]

I was woken at 6am today by a rattling at my windows and thought someone was trying to break into my house. After I sat up, I heard a deep, rumbling boom and knew immediately it was an explosion. Could someone explain why I heard the rattling before the explosion?
Keep it simple please, I'm an Arts graduate and a science dunce.

[stevie21]

The shock wave travels faster than sound so the noise comes later.

[fo3nix]

Just like thunder and lightning; the lightning comes first, then the thunder, as light travels faster than sound.

[Drusilla]

Do either of you know the speed of a shock wave then??? Or is that question as dumb as it sounds??

[logman]

I would say that depends on the stenght of the blast

[bernardo]

The shock waves go through the ground faster than the sound waves in the air. The speed of the shock waves in the ground vary a lot according to what type of material there is in the ground, so shock waves can go through lots of different layers of earth at different speeds. Measuring the time that it takes these different types of waves to arrive at different places in the world is the way they work out the depth and location of earthquakes.

[mibn2cweus]

Sound, in a broader sense, is mechanical energy traveling through a medium. Typically the denser the medium (air, water, steel) or (gas, liquid, solid) the faster it travels.