If I'm driving at the speed of sound and passed someone who yelled at me, do I continue hearing what they said

Question

Or if there is a car next to me traveling at the speed of sound and someone says my name will I hear it over and over if continually speed up and slow down?

Answer 1

Well, if they were going slowly and you were going quickly and this were an idealized scenario, you'd get a doppeler effect, where approaching you'd hear it all compressed way down, when you're perpendicular to them you'd hear a brief instant at the right speed, and then moving away from them again you'd hear it all slowed way down...

Recall, you're traveling parallel to them, most likely. And you'd be traveling perpendicular to the sound wave (though it would try to dissipate in 3 dimensions). So, you wouldn't catch up to the sound wave and match its speed since you'd be traveling in the wrong direction or at the wrong velocity (taking into account speed and direction). If they were speaking forward and you were traveling forward likely you'd parallel the sound wave but never really hear it (maybe an extraordinarily faint echo since the sound would diffuse in other directions than forward).

Of course we don't live in a "perfect" or "ideal" environment. If you're traveling at the speed of sound, you're creating tremendous drag on the air around you which turns into basically an aerodynamic envelope. Likely their shouting wouldn't be sufficient to overcome this mass of flowing air around your car or jet or whatever, so you probably wouldn't hear much anyway...

If you were both traveling in the same reference frame (speed of sound) light would be exchanged evenly and you'd be moving the same speed relative to each other, so there wouldn't be any doppeler effects of light or whatever (no relativistic effects for the most part too, I think? Though relativity is weird an nonsensical). But sound is based on compression in a medium (air) and the space between you might appear to be moving extraordinarily fast. It would be like trying to yell through a river, the sound vibrations would likely be carried away down the streaming meadia before reaching each others' ears. IE, your vehicles are moving the smae speed, but the air in between is NOT. Now if you were both in the same vehicle and the same frame of reference without a barrier moving at the speed of sound, you could probably talk just fine as if you were riding in the same car...

Make sense?

Answer 2

You won't hear it. Sound is produced by differences in air pressure on your drum. If you travel together with this wave you won't feel the whole wave (your whole name), you will be traveling with just one sound of your name, there will be no differences of pressure any more so you will hear only once one sound in your name (not all the letters).

To hear your name several times you would have to travel slower than the speed of sound to hear the whole name once and then faster to catch up with the sound again to hear it twice. Of course this is theoretically, because sound wave will be soon absorbed in the air and transformed into work.

Answer 3

You would not hear anything since that sound would be Doppler shifted to infinite wavelength, or infinitely low frequency. That is to say, lower than the lowest base sound, wayyyy down looowwww.

Answer 4

You will not hear him if you have already passed him. but if he yells before you pass him you will hear him due to Doppler effect.

Answer 5

Don't think you'd continue hearing it. But its a simple experiment, why don't you try it.

Answer 6

no until you slow down. ...and thats only if the sound wave traveled that far.

Answer 7

no u cant but if ur direction is just opposite to him (u are moving towards him),u can hear him.

Answer 8

Not if you passed them already