PARKVILLE, Mo. — Kansas City Chiefs fans relish the fact that they’ve helped make GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium the loudest stadium in the world.
With changes coming to part of the stadium to accommodate FIFA World Cup 26, those same fans are excited to make Arrowhead even louder next season.
“Last year, I had a guy that plugged his ears and asked me if I understood how loud I am,” said Andrea Lara, a 25-year Chiefs season ticket member. “I'm like, ‘Do you know where you are?’ Yeah, loud is what we do. If I have a voice on Monday, then I've done something wrong.”
Lara sits in Section 132, Row 6 — an area of Arrowhead’s lower bowl impacted when seating along the visiting team’s sideline had to be replaced with removable seating to allow for a wider field during next summer’s global soccer spectacle.
“I saw a video six months ago, whenever they started renovations, and I realized, since I'm pretty down close, that my seats were missing immediately,” Lara said.
Every seat is being replaced, but the seats in the first five to 15 rows from Sections 131 to 107 along the northeast sideline will now be mounted on aluminum bleachers, which will reverberate much louder than concrete under the feet of stomping fans.
“Oh, we're going to be stomping them really hard, I'm sure,” said eight-year season ticket member Darryl Janes, who sits in Section 106, Row 14. “... We make a difference, and we're proud of that.”
The aluminum seating also will make a difference in the fans’ effort to disrupt the opposing team.
“Being closer to any sound source means it's going to be more intense,” Park University Physics Professor Dr. Alexander Silvius said. “So, since these aluminum stands are on the visitor side, it will be much more intense for them than anyone else. It will be louder and it will be more disruptive in that case.”
Silvius said the frequency produced by stomping on aluminum bleachers will hit the ear much louder than the frequency produced by stomping on concrete.
“It's going to add to the noise, the cacophony of all the sound that's going on in the stadium,” Silvius said. “... The average decibels that Arrowhead produces will be increased a certain amount because of these aluminum stands.”
Chiefs fans famously set a Guinness World Record for Loudest Outdoor Stadium eleven years ago, peaking at 142.2 decibels — or louder than a jet engine — during a lopsided September 2014 romp against the New England Patriots.
“It's gonna be louder inside now,” Lara said. “I can't imagine that but, yeah, it's gonna be wonderful. ... We're the loudest in the whole world. I love when another team can't hear the plays coming. I love being able to be a factor in the game.”
Fans see no reason to stop at 142.2 decibels.
“Seattle had it (the Guinness World Record) for a second,” Janes said. “We got it back, and we take a lot of pride in that. We like being loud. ... I wouldn't go to the gold seats. I wouldn't go upstairs. I love the floor. We stand, we scream, we yell, and we take a lot of pride in it. We have a blast.”
Silvius said ear protection at Chiefs games — maybe some red earplugs, he suggested — are a good idea, but that it’s not overly dangerous because the level of noise above 90 decibels isn’t sustained for hours on end, rising and falling instead with the game action.
He also credited fans with making Arrowhead the deafening thunderdome it’s known as.
“If we push it past that 142 (decibels) that would be incredible, because it's more intensity, which means it's more energy,” Silvius said. “When they talk about the energy of the stands, it's quite literally the energy in the sound that the fans are producing.”
And no one does it better than Chiefs fans at Arrowhead.
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