WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY) - Phone calls have poured in from across the Cape Fear reporting loud booms strong enough to shake the earth Friday afternoon around 3:00pm and Saturday morning around 10:15am. So, what's causing these mysterious booms? No one is claiming them.
So far, the US Geological Survey isn't reporting any earthquakes in the area.
The Marine Corps in Jacksonville says it's not playing war games out in the ocean.
Sunny Point isn't claiming anything.
We've checked with GE in Castle Hayne - no reports of anything there.
The nuclear power plant is Brunswick County says its not responsible.
We've also checked with the tower at ILM and they have no reports of any planes creating sonic booms.
The Sheriff's Departments in New Hanover, Pender and Brunswick Counties are also getting reports of shaking, but don't know yet what the cause was.
An explanation that many are now suggesting is the legend of the "Seneca Guns." Some believe the ghosts of the Seneca Indians are getting revenge by using the guns that Europeans used on them so many years ago.


Just felt one
North Howe Street, Southport, NC, 10:52 am, 11/16/2010.....
Boom...
11/17/10 Holden Beach area
11/17/10 Holden Beach area about 11:30 (I think?) Have heard several big booms in the past week. I just assume they are sonic booms, as a few seconds afterward you can usually hear the jet. What's all the hype, when we are so close to several military bases? Seneca Guns? Shifting plates? I think not, I heard them as I was growing up in KY and was always told it was sonic booms. Doesn't bother me, but scares the heck out of my dog :o)
rumble
The widows, doors, cabinets all shook. The dog got scared and upset and started to bark. 10 minutes later military jets flew over fast and low. I looked around and saw cracks in the Sheetrock at seem areas, cracks in the concrete on the back porch. Are they dynamiting underground bunkers? I don't know what this gov. is up to, but I do know they owe me money to fix the damages and emotional stress they have been causing us. This has happened more than once and they keep shrugging their shoulders and giving this half wit excuse about some mystical Seneca guns or some crap. I say stop the crap and tell us what the heck is going on. I say we demand to know what they are up to. And don't give me some national security secret crap either. If it is effecting me, my family and my home it's now MY security and I have a right to know the truth!!!
Blah Blah Blah Blah Blah,
Blah Blah Blah Blah Blah, get a life, sounds like your just making this crap up. The government did nothing to you, fix it yourself grumpy lazy jerk
booms
Large Hadron Collider- created the "mini big bang" on 7 nov maybe the booms were a lead up to this
i heard a boom on kure beach
i heard a boom on kure beach at about 1 a.m. 3 days ago, it lit up the entire sky near the beach.. i have been hearing this same noise for about a month across the country. i heard it in anchorage ak a few times before i flew down to ilm, i think its military.. but who knows.
awesome
It's the Tommy Knockers!!!! lol
No, it's the
No, it's the "Langoliers".........LMAO
LOL @ both of you.
LOL @ both of you.
boom
we felt it at Long Beach Sat am about 10: 15 am, shook the house then again about 10 to 15 min. later.
It is without a doubt our
It is without a doubt our military men and women playing with their toy's at hand- F-15'S, F-16'S , 18'S AND THE NEW ONE F-22 RAPTOR. No doubt in my mind. As the sign say's in NEW RIVER and other places its the SOUND OF FREEDOM.
S/F ROGER FLEMING
Seneca Guns or Loran Guns?
I find it very interesting that the one other place in our country where this occasionally happens is in Seneca New York. Seneca New Your is also home to a Loran station like we have at Carolina Beach. They operate by producing ultra low frequencies. It would not explain the reports from the 1800's or even early 1900's but could be something to look into. Mishap with the Loran system? I have no further explanation, just an observation.
BOOM
Hey this is after all The Military State. These booms could be MILES outside of the coastal shelf and still be heard. So what it there were "government tagged" vehicles in ILM darting traffic. Those could be from INS or some other alphabet agency in the Govt. Tags are Tags on the government vehicles.
Remember what it says at the entrance to Cherry Point...That's the Sound of Freedom!
tremors
The idea that it is ghosts shooting guns is 100% not it.
whatever it is causes the ground to shake, so much that a well built building vibrates its tail off. I felt it on Blue Clay Rd in Wilmington. It was also felt in Carolina beach and leland
booms
we heard one loud one this morning around 4am followed by 6 smaller ones .. interesting
BOOMS
Might of been from the Chili cook off.
Chili con freholes
I agree with you, I think it was the Chili, because I know my husband was in the area.
Booms Solved
Everyone has it all wrong on the booms. What you are experiencing is the collapse of the atmosphere due to a huge continental United States vacuum. We were warned of this vacuum by Ross Perot way back in 1992. He told us of the "Large sucking sound of jobs leaving our country". So what you all are hearing is the large sucking sound of our jobs leaving the US in advance of Obamacare tax hikes taking effect on Jan 1, 2011.
That was by far, the best
That was by far, the best answer I have read yet!! I think you have solved they mystery!
war games off the coast
i remember one time taking this guy home ,he was rather drunk at the time ,but he claimed he was rather high up in command in the navy and asked if i had noticed any tremors .
i said yes.
"this was years ago by the way ,when i was a cab driver"
"he mentioned that they where training off the coast for the war and that they where firing the big guns is what caused it."
being that it's a military exercise and off the coast then yeah no body would know ....being that they guy was drunk maybe he split the beans?
or could just have been telling stories,but i doubt it's ghost >.>
My 2 cents...
I felt the one Saturday morning. i was sitting in my living room, watching TV and my 2 dogs were asleep on the floor. It lasted about 5 seconds but scared the hell out of me...and my dogs jumped about 2 feet off the ground. It felt like someone picked up the whole house and tossed it back down on its foundation. I live very close to the airport and always see and hear the military aircraft flying over...trust me...that's NOT it...because they do it all of the time. I have even spent time in the Air Force on a flight line. I know what a sonic boom sounds like...and this was definitely not a sonic boom. What is it? I have no idea. I also have lived very close to a limestone quarry and have experienced the tremors from dynamite explosions...this was close but still, not it, especially when people all over this town have experienced it.
I have a feelings though we will never know. I have been here almost 10 years and NEVER felt this before.
UNDER COVERAGE GOVERNMENT AGENTS & MORE MILITARY PRESENCE
I have seen alot of US Government Seals & plates on vehicles with no name of the agency on them driving around Wilmington. One turned around on MLK in the media and darted quickly back east towards Wrightsville Beach. Also I have taken notice of lots of military aircraft in the skyes around Wilmington, and military helicopters. It seems strange to me that there is more of a presence here now than a month, or even a year ago. Who are the agents that I can't seem to place with the agency name on them, Homeland Security, CIA, or the other 16 intelligent agencies? What is going on here in Wilmington we need to know about that there needs a heighten level of the US Government here. We all argue on how the government is run, but this is our home, we want to protect it also.
Sorry for the typos. Lack
Sorry for the typos. Lack of sleep does that.
Mystery Booms Rattle North Carolina Since 1850s
http://www.rense.com/general13/mysterybooms.htm
By Jerry Allegood
Raleigh News & Observer
9-1-1
FORT FISHER, N.C. -- The sound rolls in off the ocean like an invisible tidal wave, washing over houses with enough force to rattle windows and startling people who look uneasily to the ground and to the sky for an explanation.
Boom. Rattle. Rattle boom. And it is over as quickly as it began.
The mysterious noises have been reported as far back as the 1850s.
Now, a Duke University seismologist hopes to find clues about the mystery sound's origins as a side benefit from an earthquake research project.
Peter Malin, a seismology professor for 10 years, plans to monitor a sensor that has been placed deep in the ground at the Fort Fisher State Historic Site near Wilmington.
The sensor is intended to record minor seismic activity that might indicate when more significant quakes can be expected.
There is no explanation for the sounds, at least not one on which everyone agrees.
Some say the rumbling is a sonic boom created by unseen aircraft. Others suggest top-secret military training offshore or maybe the earth moving on the ocean floor or deep below ground.
Then there are the theories that gave the phenomenon its name, the Seneca Guns -- that the sound comes from the ghosts of American Indians firing guns to disturb descendants of those who drove them from their land.
This name first arose in New York, then applied to North Carolina, even though there were no Seneca Indians there.
Malin's hunch is that the booming noise originates in the atmosphere, although he has no particular theory on the cause.
He heard the sound and saw its impact in July while preparing his project. Doors and windows shook, but the house didn't, he said, indicating to him that the ground did not move.
Residents who have heard the noise for years have ruled out obvious suspects such as thunder because the booms have occurred on clear days when there were no clouds or lightning.
Accounts of the rumbling date back to the days before airplanes, much less supersonic jets that fly fast enough to break the sound barrier.
There is no particular pattern, although in the past they have been reported most often in the fall and spring.
Other scientists have suggested that the interplay between water and weather might be causing the sounds.
Some people say that the mystery should never to solved, but Malin says that there is good scientific basis for his wanting to figure it out.
It's actually
a light clap and then a big boom. McIntyre smacked his head and then fainted when he realized Pelosi would not fade away.
Boom
I heard this boom last week, and it shook my house and rattled the windows just a wee bit.
I live in Bladen County, and I am curious if any others heard it this far out.
I have read about the Seneca booms, and it is an interesting phenomenon.
Oh no - here we go again
This is just a lead in to another Bigfoot sighting ...
When there is no explanation -
When there is no explanation... Earthquakes? - It felt like something just barely picked up my house and dropped it. It would have been enough movement to register.
Sonis Boom? - Possibly, After Saturday's rattle, I heard a jet.
Alien craft? - come on people - really?
War games? - now that is a definite possibility especially since the government is denying it.
The government agencies are denying involvement then you can usually bet that the government is lying.
Loud booms
There is a phenomenon called Seneca Guns.
http://www.humanresonance.org/wilmington.html
http://www.starnewsonline.com/article/20080208/BREAKING/219232410
Earth boomers
I was working at my office on Market Street near Ogden on Friday when I thought that a car exploded right outside our building. Next I went outside and not a sign of anything. I find it strange that no one has a clue what caused this extreme boom. Though I will say somebody knows, their just not saying for what ever reason.