Assessment of the acceptability of sonic booms of planned supersonic commercial aircraft or business jets

Aeschbach, D., Bartels, S., Weidenfeld, S., Kuhlmann, J., Schreckenberg, D., van de Par, S., & Töpken, S. (2026). Assessment of the acceptability of sonic booms of planned supersonic commercial aircraft or business jets. German Environment Agency. https://doi.org/10.60810/openumwelt-8303

Abstract english

Future civil supersonic aircraft (low-boom aircraft) are intended to produce significantly quieter sonic booms. The effects of these novel sonic booms on humans, especially on sleep, are still unclear. In one study, 37 people were examined in a sleep laboratory. The results show that sleep was more disturbed in the low-boom condition, annoyance was higher, and self-rated sleep quality was worse than in the Mach cut-off condition (a noise-reducing flight procedure). In addition, a literature review was conducted, and its results were used to derive criteria for assessing the acceptability of sonic booms from future civil supersonic aircraft for the population.