Originally Posted by
chevvron
You're obviously too young to have heard an F100 engaging its afterburner.
We had a couple based at Farnborough after Experimental Flying Wing moved to Boscombe (they needed an airfield with arrestor gear) and when the tower controller heard one engage the 'burner during engine ground runs, he thought it had blown up and pressed the crash alarm! I'd heard them many times before at air displays.
For the uninitiated, the F100 is a Pratt & Whitney engine used on F-15s and F-16s. Loud, but not as loud as some of the older engines.