Can humans hear 200 decibels?
Though a 'normal' audible range for loudness is from 0 to 180dB, anything over 85dB is considered damaging, so we should try not to go there. As we age, it's the upper frequencies we lose first. So by the time we hit middle-age, we can expect to hear up to around 14,000Hz.
A sperm whale's click is 200 decibels, the unit used to measure the intensity of a sound, said Jennifer Miksis-Olds, associate professor of acoustics at Penn State.
Sound is measured in decibels (dB). A whisper is about 30 dB, normal conversation is about 60 dB, and a motorcycle engine running is about 95 dB. Noise above 70 dB over a prolonged period of time may start to damage your hearing. Loud noise above 120 dB can cause immediate harm to your ears.
At 194 dB, the energy in the sound waves starts distorting and they create a complete vacuum between themselves. The sound is no longer moving through the air, but is in fact pushing the air along with it, forming a pressurized wall of moving air.
Almost all firearms create noise that is over the 140-dB level. A small . 22-caliber rifle can produce noise around 140 dB, while big-bore rifles and pistols can produce sound over 175 dB.
A nuclear bomb.
Decibel meters set 250 feet away from test sites peaked at 210 decibels. The sound alone is enough to kill a human being, so if the bomb doesn't kill you, the noise will.
If we suppose that the same fraction of a supernova's energy is converted to sound, and a supernova releases 1044 joules, That means that about 1044/(840 billion) = 1032 Joules of sound energy, thirty-two orders of magnitude greater than 120 dB, or about 440 decibels.
Human screams can be quite loud, possibly exceeding 100 dB (as of March 2019, the world record is 129 dB!) —but you probably want to avoid that because screams that loud can hurt your ears!
Sounds above 150 dB have the potential of causing life-threatening issues. Sounds between 170-200 dB are so intense that they can cause lethal issues like pulmonary embolisms, pulmonary contusions, or even burst lungs. As for exploding heads, you can expect that from sounds above 240 dB.
The grenade is thrown and explodes after a roughly 1.5-second delay. The explosion of magnesium-based pyrotechnic chemicals causes a very bright flash and a loud sound (160−180 decibels), which can cause temporary blindness, temporary loss of hearing and loss of balance, as well as a sense of panic.
How loud is a shotgun blast?
170 – 190 decibels: For example, a shot gun blast or a rocket lift off.
Not only can baleen whales emit calls that travel farther than any other voice in the animal kingdom, these giants of the deep also create the loudest vocalisations of any creature on earth: the call of a blue whale can reach 180 decibels – as loud as a jet plane, a world record.

Tsar Bomba (224dB)
The Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs of 1945 destroyed cities in an instant – but the Tsar bomb was 3,300 times stronger than that and is considered the strongest sound every produced by mankind, with the most reliable figure suggesting it clocked at 224dB.
Converting the energy of 1,100 decibels to mass yields 1.113x1080 kg, meaning that the radius of the resulting black hole's event horizon would exceed the diameter of the known universe. Voila! No more universe.
Apparently, a sound of 1,100 decibels would create so much energy, it would act as a immensely high quantity of mass. This would, in turn, create enough gravity to form an extremely large black hole! Larger, in fact, than our observable universe.
50 caliber (black powder) – 159.7 dB.
The outside of aircraft engines (around 140 dB at takeoff) and conditions on other aircraft may have higher or lower noise levels. Sound insulation also varies among aircraft.
Noise Source | Decibel Level |
---|---|
Passenger car at 65 mph at 25 ft (77 dB); freeway at 50 ft from pavement edge 10 a.m. (76 dB). Living room music (76 dB); radio or TV-audio, vacuum cleaner (70 dB). | 70 |
Conversation in restaurant, office, background music, Air conditioning unit at 100 ft | 60 |
DeForest pegs the sun's din on Earth at around 100 decibels, a bit quieter than the speakers at a rock concert. That's during the day, of course. At night, as we turn away from the sun, the roar would fade.
The Loudest Sound, Naturally
The loudest sound in recorded history came from the volcanic eruption on the Indonesian island Krakatoa at 10.02 a.m. on August 27, 1883. The explosion caused two thirds of the island to collapse and formed tsunami waves as high as 46 m (151 ft) rocking ships as far away as South Africa.
How loud is a black hole?
Hailey et al.) For the first time in history, earthlings can hear what a black hole sounds like: a low-pitched groaning, as if a very creaky heavy door was being opened again and again.
The answer might surprise you, as solar physicists estimate that the solar surface noise would be approximately 100dB by the time it reaches Earth! The enormity of the sun's surface paired with its capability of generating of tens of thousands of watts of sound energy per meter makes the sun astronomically loud.
Train horns are typically between 110-140 decibels in sound level!
Sonic booms generate enormous amounts of sound energy, about 110 decibels, like the sound of an explosion or a thunderclap.
Car horn: 110 decibels. Nightclub: 110 decibels. Ambulance siren: 112 decibels.