Copyright © University of Cambridge. All rights reserved.

'Mach Attack' printed from https://nrich.maths.org/

Show menu

To see the shape of the wave fronts you might want to draw $5$ wave fronts emitted by the aeroplane at times $t=0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5$. The orgin of each wave front will depend on the position of the aeroplane when it is created; once created each will be a circle whose radius grows at the speed of sound.