This Canadian city is plagued by an obnoxious humming—and it’s getting worse

Years before diplomats in Cuba were assailed by grating noises and left with baffling brain injuries, the residents of a Canadian city began hearing maddening hums and rumbles. The deep noises mysteriously wash in and out of their neighborhoods and homes, hitting the ears of some but not all residents. And according to recent local news coverage, the eerie disturbances are now getting bad again.

Since 2011, some residents of Windsor, Ontario—directly across the border/river from Detroit, Michigan—reported intermittent bursts of noise established as the “Windsor Hum.” It’s described as a low-frequency throbbing sound, like a fleet of idling diesel engines, a distant rumble of thunder, or a roaring furnace. Some “hummers” report feeling vibrations, too, and having items in their homes rattle. They’ve linked the hum to depression, nausea, sleep problems, heart palpitations, ear aches, headaches—not to mention widespread annoyance.

Windsor residents are not imagining it; there is a real hum. A months-long investigation by Natural Resources Canada in the summer of 2011 identified a prominent, air-borne frequency of approximately 35Hz. There have been plenty of recordings and reports since then. And its existence was confirmed in a 2014 investigation carried out by the University of Western Ontario (UWO) and the University of Windsor, which was supported by the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade (DFAIT).

Both government investigations couldn’t definitively pinpoint the source of the nuisance noise. But based on triangulated measurement data and observations, they both concluded that the likely source is something on Zug Island.

Zug island is an industrial island that sits at the southern city limits of Detroit and slightly southwest of Windsor, across the Detroit river. For thousands of years, the marsh land was a Native American burial ground. But a shipping canal formed it into an island in the late 1800s, and the patch of land was sold to be an industrial dumping ground. It later became an area of concentrated manufacturing and steel production, with two high-capacity blast furnaces.

Researchers speculate that those blast furnaces and irregular operations at the steel mills are the sources of the noise. The researchers observed that the Hum coincided with the appearance of bright blue flames on the islands’ exhaust stacks, which were easily seen from the Canadian shoreline at night.

US Steel operates the furnaces, but residents and activists have complained that the company has been secretive and uncooperative in efforts to mute the hum. DFAIT was not granted access to the island during the government-funded investigation, and researchers had to take boats across the river to get close to the island’s shoreline for readings.

US Steel did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Ars.

The lack of access and information about activity on the island has fueled wild speculation and frustration. Activists are working on a documentary that flirts with conspiracy ideas, and residents have been actively trying to stamp down talk of UFOs, aliens, and “covert ops” on the island.  Windsor residents have appealed to all levels of government for help on the issue but have largely gotten nowhere.

Windsor residents aren’t the only ones in proximity to Zug Island who have reported hearing the hum. There have been reports from LaSalle and Amherstburg to the south and even nearby to Cleveland to the east. But parliament member Brian Masse representing Windsor West told the Windsor Star that tackling the noise has become a “jurisdictional nightmare.”

“We need an international agreement on this,” Masse said. “There is no legislation in terms of (noise) enforcement capabilities. Right now, it has to be done out of professional courtesy on the US side.”

The Windsor Hum isn’t the first case of a town plagued by a mysterious and unnerving hum. Rumblings in Taos, New Mexico, Bristol, England, and a handful of other locations have made headlines with their unexplained phenomena. As in Windsor, the hums affect some residents but not all and are often described as idling diesel engines. Predictions vary as to their sources, ranging from environmental features to mechanical sources, radio towers, psychological issues, and tinnitus, a persistent ringing in the ear.

This story has been updated to correct an error in the name of Natural Resources Canada.