Comments on a Procedure for Rating High-Energy Impulsive Sounds: Analyses of Previous and New Data Sets,and Suggestions for a Revision

Abstract

Results from field-laboratory studies suggest that the annoyance caused by high-energy impulsive sounds increases more rapidly with sound level than the annoyance caused by vehicle passby sounds. After a further analysis of field survey data collected around, among other things, two American artillery ranges [Paul D. Schomer, Noise Control Eng. J. 42, 179–191 (1994)], it was concluded that the community response confirmed the results from the field-laboratory tests. In the present study, it is shown that this conclusion is not justified. From the results of a new more systematic re-analysis, it is concluded that the community response to high-energy impulsive artillery sounds and traffic sounds cannot be understood from the field-laboratory results mentioned above. For rating procedures which are based on sound levels determined in free-field conditions, application of the model with the previously recommended parameter values would lead to an underestimation of the rating sound level for artillery sounds by almost 15 dB. The data obtained in a new Germany field survey on the community response to artillery and road-traffic sounds were used in a supplementary analysis, which essentially confirmed the results of the re-analysis. On the basis of both the American and Germany field data, and the results from recent studies including very high blast and sonic boom levels, a provisional revised model was developed for rating artillery shooting sounds and other high-energy impulsive sounds such as sonic booms and quarry explosions.

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