Eli5: How can a shock wave, as from an explosion, travel faster than the speed of sound?

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Eli5: How can a shock wave, as from an explosion, travel faster than the speed of sound?

In: Physics

4 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

Some of it has to do with your definition of speed of sound. The speed of sound changes as a function of temperature. So your undisturbed medium has a speed of sound, and the air in/behind the shock is very hot and thus has a different speed of sound. Remember speed of sound is sqrt(gamma*R*Temperature)

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