Loud noises may make you aware of tinnitus and aggravate it. My
personal belief is tinnitus is not from typical loud noises but rather
an ongoing and continual health problem long existing before the
awareness.

I expose myself to very loud noises every so-often (not intentionally)
and it doesn't make my tinnitus return or worse. Similarly others are
exposed to explosions and never get tinnitus.

gvorac...@aol.com wrote:

I was assured by a doctor who himself suffers from hearing damage and
tinnitus, that a single exposure to a loud sound will not cause
tinnitus. There is a set criteria for exposure to x decibels for x
length of time. As I understand it, some people do seem to contract
tinnitus after having been exposed a single instance of loud noise,
but it's probable that the tinnitus would have developed anyways.
Based on what I've learned, tinnitus is often the result of lifelong
little damages to your ear; sirens, firecrackers, loud music,
machinery etc. My theory is, that there's probably some loud noise
that ends up being the last straw, which finally triggers the
tinnitus, but the person was already 99% of the way there. So if that
person hadn't been in an electrics store that was playing loud music
that day, then some other loud noise would have finally set it off.