Serving Barnwell County and it's neighbors since 1852
The Christmas weekend started with a mysterious boom.
Many people took to Facebook Friday evening, Dec. 23, to report hearing a loud boom around 10 p.m. People heard it across multiple counties, including parts of Barnwell, Allendale and Bamberg counties, according to posts on Facebook.
"My neighbors and ourselves were in the yards looking for a downed tree or something. Not only did we hear it but it shook our house. It knocked pictures off our neighbor's walls and knocked a few things off a table and shelf in our house. Whatever it was, was loud and shook the houses," said Colleen Noonan, who lives in Barnwell.
An earthquake, meth lab explosion, blown transformer, and training at local plants have topped some of the speculation as to the cause on Facebook; however, county officials are still searching for answers.
“We didn’t feel anything but we heard it. We don’t have any evidence of what it could have been,” said Chief Deputy Darlene Cook with the Barnwell County Sheriff’s Office.
From her house in the City of Barnwell, Chief Cook said it sounded like a transformer blew, but people near Snelling reported the noise sounding louder, she said.
Barnwell County Dispatch has no reports of the cause. Chief Cook said the fire departments were never dispatched for a fire or explosion, and the power company was not aware of any blown transformer. No earthquake has been reported by the U.S. Geological Survey.
“We went to the local plants to see if they had an explosion, but we found nothing,” said Cook.
Some have suggested it was a sonic boom, a sound associated with shock waves created when an object travels through the air faster than the speed of sound.
"I know there is an air squadron that is temporarily located at the Columbia airport and have night runs towards the coast so that could have been a sonic boom," said Troy Burns on Facebook.
Others believe the boom could have been from a cryoseism, ice quake or frost quake, which refers to a seismic event caused by a sudden cracking action in frozen soil or rock saturated with water or ice, or by stresses generated at frozen lakes.
The cause of the noise remains a mystery.
