On Wednesday, a Delta Air Lines flight from Salt Lake City to Amsterdam had to divert to Minneapolis after “significant” turbulence.
A passenger on that flight said that dinner service had just started on the flight when the turbulence came out of nowhere.
“There was actually no warning. It was a very abrupt, hard hit,” Nash said. “If you didn’t have your seat belt on — everyone that didn’t — they hit the ceiling, and then they fell to the ground, and the carts also hit the ceiling and fell to the ground, and people were injured, and it happened several times, so it was really scary,” said passenger Leeann Nash.
And this is by no means an isolated example.
In the US alone, there have been 207 severe injuries, where an individual has been admitted to a hospital for more than 48 hours, since 2009.
But as climate change shifts atmospheric conditions, experts warn that air travel could become bumpier.
Temperature changes and shifting wind patterns in the upper atmosphere will only increase.
“We can expect a doubling or tripling in the amount of severe turbulence around the world in the next few decades,” says Professor Paul Williams, an atmospheric scientist at the University of Reading.
“For every 10 minutes of severe turbulence experienced now, that could increase to 20 or 30 minutes.”
“Climate change is warming the air to the south of the jet stream more than the air to the north so that temperature difference is being made stronger,” explains Prof Williams. “Which in turn is driving a stronger jet stream.”
Is there any way aircraft can “turbulence-proof” their planes? So far, there is no solution.