Andrew Davies was traveling to New Zealand for an exhibition where he was a project manager. The flight from London to Singapore started off smoothly, but suddenly the plane was hit by severe turbulence.
“Being on a rollercoaster is the best way to describe it,” he says. “After I was pushed into the seat, we suddenly fell. The iPad hit my head, and the coffee ran through my body.” Several passengers were seriously injured, while Geoff Kitchen, 73, died of a heart attack.
Although deaths from turbulence are very rare — with only a few cases since 1981 — injuries are more common. In the US alone, over 2009 serious injury incidents have been recorded since 200, many of which involved crew members.
Climate change is affecting atmospheric conditions, causing flights to experience more severe turbulence. Professor Paul Williams from the University of Reading says we can expect this turbulence to double or triple in the coming decades.
Currently, of the more than 35 million flights a year worldwide, about 5,000 have incidents with severe turbulence. About 40% of serious passenger injuries during 2023 were caused by these air movements, according to the International Civil Aviation Organization.
The North Atlantic region, where many flights between the UK and the US, Canada and the Caribbean pass, has seen a 55% increase in severe turbulence over the past 40 years.
Turbulence comes from three main sources: those associated with precipitation and storms, air flow over mountains, and "clear air" - sudden movements of air that cannot be seen.
Climate change is playing a role in increasing these phenomena, creating conditions for stronger storms and greater changes in the air. Storm clouds, such as cumulonimbus, are the main source of the severe vertical turbulence experienced by passengers.
In recent years, turbulence predictions have improved significantly and today about 75% of cases of clear-air turbulence can be identified.
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