The Windstorm® is a natural solution when safety is a consideration. Whistles help keep contact sports safe. Particularly for high school, college and professional football, with modern helmets and deafening crowds, the sound of a whistle can be vital in preventing injury. But recently, players have been accused of illegal and potentially dangerous late hits. Current research is prepared to show that the referee’s whistle may be the real guilty party.
The ability for a whistle to be heard over the drone of screaming fans, the crash of impacting pads and the insulation of the football helmet depends essentially on two factors: the loudness and the frequency. Whistles producing predominately low frequency sounds are more easily heard when compared to whistles generating high frequency tones. Low frequency sounds carry more effectively over long distances or through structures such as glass, foam, or plastic when compared to higher frequency tones.
The Windstorm and various other popular whistles were tested to evaluate what effect wearing a football helmet had on the ability of the player to hear a referee whistle. The studies were conducted in a sound proof chamber under the direction of research scientists at the Central Institute for the Deaf in St. Louis, Missouri. Data shows how the helmet acts as a strong filter, allowing some sounds to be heard clearly by the player while blocking out others. The following graph represents how whistle sounds are received through a football helmet, and clearly shows how the Windstorm® whistle is louder than other popular whistles.