PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. – Area law enforcement agencies and the News4Jax newsroom received dozens of phone calls Friday morning from people reporting what sounded like a sonic boom.
The St. Johns County Sheriff's Office alone received about 50 calls before 11 a.m., many from the Ponte Vedra Beach area. The calls also came in from the Nocatee, Palencia, Fruit Cove and Durbin Crossing areas.
911 operator: 911. What is your emergency?
Caller: I just heard a big blast and it sounded like dynamite exploding. I don't know where it came from. It shook my house. So I'm curious as to what's going on or what it was.
Callers reported it sounded like an explosion and their homes shook around 9:30 a.m.
One caller said the boom knocked her out of a chair. "Shook the garage door. I thought it was going to come off the rollers. I don't see anything," she told the operator.
The St. John's County Sheriff's Office said the loud noise also triggered many alarm systems.
"It was equivalent to someone dropping a big dumpster right in the center of my house," one caller said.
The sonic boom would possibly be from an F-18 or F-22 aircraft.
The FAA said military aircraft were in the area Friday, but could not confirm if one broke the sound barrier.
A spokesman for the Navy said none of their F-18s are offshore as the recent training involving the USS Theodore Roosevelt has concluded its recent COMPTUEX exercises.
One or two fighter jets from Marine Air Station Beaufort were scheduled to fly out of Savannah on Friday. But MAS Beaufort told News4Jax their planes did not come this far south.