The Forest Grove Noise That Tormented An Oregon Town
Andrew Dawes/FacebookA map showing locations where residents heard the Forest Grove Noise, used in an unsuccessful attempt to triangulate it.
For several weeks in 2016, a loud, high-pitched screech filled the air above the small suburb of Forest Grove, Oregon.
Residents described it in numerous ways, from a mechanical scream to a high-pitched train whistle. Oddly, the sound was only ever heard at night.
Local station KGW 8 reported that the Forest Grove Police Captain, Mike Herbs, said, “There would be a city ordinance violation if somebody was creating a noise like this, that late at night on purpose to annoy people,” but at that point didn’t have “information that would lead us to believe that’s the case.”
Other residents, such as Paula Lynch, heard the noise multiple times around 10:30 or 11 p.m. and initially suspected it may have been a gas line issue or some sort of fire alarm, but the Forest Grove Fire Department ruled out that possibility.
Further testing was done by the Department of Forestry nearby, which also discovered no evidence that the sound came from any of their equipment.
Mystery sound frustrates people in a west Forest Grove neighborhood. Where it could be coming from? #LiveOnK2 @ 11pm pic.twitter.com/p0inj5TBr2
— chrisliedle (@chrisliedle) February 16, 2016
Oregon Live also proffered a few residential theories, including the possibility that air might have been trapped in the sewer lines and escaped through manhole covers.
One concerned member of the community, Andrew Dawes, a physics professor at Pacific University, made a post to the Forest Grove Community Facebook group asking people to drop pins on a map with a note for the date and time they heard the noise in an effort to triangulate it.
Unfortunately, the map only added to the mystery, as no central point could be determined based on the information given.
“It’s an alien mother ship or a warning sign of something to come,” Herbs joked. “We feel there’s a logical explanation for it.”
To this day, however, no logical explanation has been found. Just like the Hum, one of the weirdest noises in history remains a complete mystery.
