A Number of Injured as In-Flight Disturbance Hits A Delta Airlines Flight Arriving in Sydney, Australia
A number of individuals sustained injuries when a Delta Airlines aircraft originating in LA to Sydney, Australia encountered significant turbulence Friday morning.
Delta Flight 41 "encountered brief turbulence" as it touched down at the Sydney airport, a company official stated. Several cabin crew members required medical attention.
Emergency medical services said they assessed five patients, and transferred three to a medical facility with relatively minor issues that such as spinal discomfort and headaches. The injured ranged from their 30s to 70s.
It is the most recent case of planes encountering severe turbulence, with experts indicating that climate change is a major factor.
On board were nearly 250 travelers and a crew of 15 on the Airbus A350, the Delta spokesperson noted, adding that the plane arrived "without further incident" at the airport at 06:48 local time on the day in question.
The NSW Ambulance Service reported they received a call just a mere three minutes ahead of the plane touched down, and emergency vehicles were ready and waiting at the airport.
Why in-flight bumpiness is getting more common - and more severe.
In the previous year, twenty-five passengers and crew were hurt when another Delta jet, travelling from Salt Lake City, Utah to Amsterdam, Netherlands, encountered "severe" rough air just a couple of hours into the long-haul flight, and had to make an unscheduled landing.
Recently, travelers and staff on a certain international flight endured a terrifying brief five-second of severe turbulence. A traveler died and numerous people sustained injuries, as those without seatbelts rose out of their seats and were slammed back.
Bumpy air is fairly routine while flying, and while cases of strong or severe turbulence are reportedly becoming more frequent, they are statistically infrequent.
Estimates show that there are an estimated five thousand cases of severe-or-greater turbulence every year, out of a overall number of more than 35 million flights that now take off globally.
Severe turbulence is defined as when the up and down movements of a aircraft going through disturbed air apply more than 1.5g-force on your body - sufficient force to lift you out of your seat if you did not have on a safety belt.
As global warming modifies atmospheric conditions, specialists caution that air travel could become less smooth: shifts in temperature and altered air currents in the upper atmosphere are expected to heighten the frequency and intensity of dangerous in-flight bumps.
