ST. LOUIS – Some sounds are easy to recognize, especially when you’ve heard them your whole life.
“I grew up here. I lived here when I was a kid. It was my parents’ house,” said Micah Mayfield.
Mayfield is now raising his family in the same unincorporated north St. Louis County home. Their lot on Old Jamestown Road is less than a half-mile from the Missouri River as the crow flies.
“Living out here is super quiet. You hear nature usually and not anything else,” he said.
But Mayfield said that changed around the first of the year.
“So low that it’s almost inaudible but super consistent. Usually in the evenings after 8 p.m. you’d hear a very low humming noise that would come in kind of a wave pattern,” he said.
“It’s over long periods of time. It’s not just for 10 or 15 minutes and goes away like a train. It’s not coinciding with barge horns. It’s over hours. And the fact it’s so consistent and present over that time, it seems something more permanent and fixed in its location.”
St. Louis County Councilwoman Shalonda Webb said she can also hear the hum from her home.
“I remember asking my husband, ‘Babe, do you hear that noise?’ And he was like, ‘What noise?’” said Webb. “When you don’t know and you’re hearing something strange in your neighborhood, that gives you concern.”
She’s got the county looking into it. Knowing Mayfield can hear it, as well as Councilwoman Webb to the west and residents of the Castlereagh neighborhood to the north, FOX 2 attempted to pinpoint the cause.
“Once we know what it is, we want to communicate so we can put minds at ease,” Webb said. “If it’s something that needs to be addressed, then we get a plan and we address whatever the cause of it is.”
Nearby, you’ll find Ameren’s Portage Des Sioux site, the Spire STL pipeline storage facility, and Central Stone Company Quarry. We even checked in with the Army Corps of Engineers and St. Louis-Lambert International Airport.
Ameren and Spire investigated and say it isn’t them. Same for the airport. We’re still waiting to hear from the Corps of Engineers. Central Stone Company Quarry had no comment; so, for now, the search continues.
“Since I’m not sure what it is, it’s hard to guess what they could do. But if there’s a way to maybe keep that noise back from the residential areas, that would be great,” Mayfield said.
