Why is it that you see the airplane before you hear the plane?

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mahsa

like thunder you first see light after hear the sound.
because the speed of the light faster than sound.

Neha S

Sound needs a medium 2 travel so u hear the plane later

niceguyx77

light travels faster than sound

Hi yÂ´all !

Because light (the image of the plane) travels so much faster than sound (the noise of the plane).
You could even measure the time span between the two and calculate how far the plane is above you. The same thing can be done with lightning and thunder.

raiders

because light is faster than sound

badgerman

You can see the plane because of light, Reflection & Refraction. Light obviously moves ALOT faster then sound.

asianricepaper

is it lighning that you are messing up?

presidentrichardnixon

Most people hear a plane first because they just do not see it first, usually because they are not actively looking for it.

I have heard many planes from my window but it is likely that I may never see those planes.

Azul

airplane is traveling faster then the speed of the sound thats why you hear the sound later....

claudieelicious

light travels faste rthan sound.
light i swhat helps you see the plane and sound is what you hear that come after!! c'mon im sure you already knew that!!

brightpool

Light travels at about 186,000 miles per second.
Sound travels at about 1,100 FEET per second through air at sea level at 70 degrees Fahrenheit (5,280 feet to a mile).

Do the math.

The sight of the plane reaches you almost instantly while the sound of the airplane reaches you in a few seconds for every mile away.

silverjacket9

Light travels faster than sound. The sun reflects off of the plane into your eyes causing the image of the plane to be seen, while the sound takes a while to catch up. Also interesting, with rainbows, the light is bent inside of tiny water droplets in the atmosphere and is directed toward your eyes. This causes a your eyes to process a picture of a rainbow. A rainbow is also a full circle, it's just that it's so large that you can only see a portion of it that looks like an arc.

miyuki & kyojin

Light travels 186,282 miles-per-second in a vacuum, while sound travels 1086 feet-per-second at sea level. As you can easily see, there is no contest in a race between what you see and what you hear.

Robert B

The reason depends on how fast the airplane is traveling. If it is exceeding the speed of sound, i.e. faster than Mach 1, then the sound that the plane makes is lagging behind. That will almost always happen exclusively with fighter and supersonic commercial jets. If you see a jumbo jet, like a Boeing 777, 747, etc, and you haven't heard it yet, you see it before you hear it because the photons that are bouncing off the plane, which travel at roughly 186,000 mph, have already reached your eyes. Sound travels at around 1,000 mph (I think), so it takes significanly longer for the sound waves to reach your ears.

Patrick C

You dont ya big dumma, or should I call you eagle eye.

esmefort

Because the speed of light is faster that the speed of sound, this is the same principle, why we see the lightning before we hear the thunder.

salientsamurai

this only happens when the plane is traveling faster then the speed of sound.

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