Quiet Down

Everyone's travel bucket list is their own. Lots of people want to go to Paris, Hong Kong, Baluchistan, or Nome. For sure, there are those who dream of Buffalo in January. It's the fun part of living, like buying a lottery ticket. For a dollar, you get to dream about winning, and it's the same way with our travel dreams.

Mine is way up there in Redmond, Washington State, at Microsoft Headquarters, where they have built an "anechoic" chamber, a room where there is no echo at all because there is no outside sound whatsoever! 

Imagine being in a room where you can hear your own heartbeat! The snap-crackle-pop of my right knee would sound like an artillery barrage! They even say that if you're there long enough, you will lose your balance, because there is no reverberation of sound, which causes you to lose spatial awareness.

This is the world of the absolute zero of sound, the world's quietest place.

Hundraj Gopal is the man who designed the room, and he says, "As soon as one enters the room, one immediately feels a strange and unique sensation which is hard to describe. Most people find the absence of sound deafening, feel a sense of fullness in the ears, or some ringing. Very faint sounds become clearly audible because the ambient noise is exceptionally low. When you turn your head, you can hear that motion. You can hear yourself breathing and it sounds somewhat loud."

Out here where we have to hear an unending symphony of din, there is always pressure on the ear drums as a result, But in the anechoic room there is no air pressure is gone, since there are no sound reflections from the surrounding walls, and, "This is a novel experience," Gopal says.

You can have such a room in your house if you want.  Just find a contractor who can build you a room built like an onion with six layers of concrete and steel, sitting on top of many vibration-stopping springs, fiberglass wedges, and ceilings and wall to baffle any sound that wants to come inside.

Oh, and when you call the contractor, it will help if you have Bill Gates-level money.

The door to the land of no more racket

Mr Gopal says, "The noise level measured inside is -20.3dBA. This means that the ambient noise in the chamber is 20.3dB below the threshold of human hearing."

By comparison, one of the quietest sounds that can be heard in a quiet room, calm breathing, clocks in at 10dB.

That's quiet. But if that's what it takes to make sure I never have to hear Adele sing again, expense is no object!