Can You Really Shatter Glass with a High Note?

Yes, a human singer really could sing high and loud enough to break glass. Learn about acoustics, resonance, and intensity in this episode of BrainStuff, based on this article: https://science.howstuffworks.com/shatter-glass-with-high-note.htm

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Brainstuff the production of I Heart Radio, Hey,
brain Stuff. Lauren vocal bomb here it's the operatic equivalent
of the slip on the banana peal scene. The soprano
on stage hits a high note so long in piercing
that it cracks the opera glasses of the elegant Dowager
in the box seat. Hollywood can do that with a

(00:23):
trick of editing. But is it possible in real life? Well,
yes it is, but so is being struck by lightning.
Both require rare convergences of particular conditions and to understand
these conditions and how they work together a crash course
and acoustics is an order. Sound is acoustic energy, like electricity.

(00:45):
Sound energy travels through substances in waves, which excites these
substances particles and causes them to vibrate at a certain frequency.
A frequency refers to the number of waves passing through
a given point over a given period of time, and
we measure frequent see and hurts. One hurts equals one
wave per second. Meanwhile, every substance has a natural or

(01:07):
resonant frequency, the frequency at which its own molecules vibrate.
For example, suppose your bass guitar playing neighbor cracks the
plaster on your walls when they play a low driving baseline.
The quality of your neighbors speakers also affect the quality
of the sound, but basically, the frequency of a bass
guitar's lower deeper notes run from forty to fifty hurts,

(01:30):
and thus the plasters resonant frequency must fall somewhere in
that range. Because when a substance encounters a frequency it matches,
it absorbs the energy rather than reflecting it. Glass shattering
waves carry more energy they're shorter and choppier, thus more
of them pass through per second at roughly five hundred

(01:50):
and fifty six hurts. To shatter glass, the notes frequency
must be the same as that of the glass. That's
one condition. The note also has to be loud quality
known as intensity. Intensity is measured in decibels, while conversational
tones average fifty to sixty decibels. A trained vocalist might
have the pipes to approach the approximately a hundred and

(02:13):
five decibels needed to break glass. Even then they would
have to be so close as to risk serious facial cuts.
If the glass does explode, more likely a boost of
electronic amplification would be needed. Finally, the glass must be
strategically selected. A wine glass is a good choice. It's
fine and thin, unlike say beer stein, which maximizes the

(02:37):
amount of stress per particle. An empty glass cracks more readily,
although less dramatically than one containing water or wine air,
being less dense, the liquid carries the sound better, and
if you can find a wine glass with a flaw
in its structure, even an invisible one, that helps by
providing a weak spot. Incidentally, real world tests involving resident

(03:00):
frequencies offer more than an excuse to shatter glass. Resident
frequency is the basis of ultrasonic testing, which is used
to determine the safety of structures ranging from pipelines to airplanes.
Ultrasonic testing is a type of non destructive testing which
allows engineers to monitor the integrity of construction materials as
where and while they're being used, which is preferable to

(03:23):
otherwise dismantling a building or airplane for analysis in a laboratory.
Today's episode is based on the article can You really
Shatter a Glass? With a high note on how stuff
works dot com, written by Christine Benzen. Brain Stuff is
a production of by Heart Radio in partnership with how
stuff Works dot Com, and it's produced by Tyler Clang.

(03:45):
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