Is it just me, or has airline turbulence been getting more frequent and worse lately? I've been flying more consistently in the last 6 months for both work and leisure, and can't help but notice how rare its been to have a smooth ride. I admit my usual airline entertainment as a kid centered around sleeping, so maybe I'm not the best reference. But meteorologists at the University of Reading in England seem to agree, and say it's likely climate change has been a significant contributor to increases in airline turbulence everywhere.
In 2017, a study in Advances in Atmospheric Sciences used climate model simulations to investigate trans-Atlantic wintertime clear-air turbulence as it relates to climate change. Researchers from the UK’s University of Reading found that a doubling of carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere could cause light turbulence to increase by roughly 59%, moderate turbulence by 4% and moderate-to-severe turbulence by 127%. - Bloomberg
Sky-High Highways
The research credits climate change to creating more turbulent air for planes by way of extreme changes in wind speeds at different altitudes. Jet-streams are large rivers, or "highways", of air moving rapidly through the atmosphere, typically at higher altitudes that planes often fly their routes in. Because the air is moving so quickly, there can be variations in certain locations that get amplified and turned into waves, kinda like driving on the highway and hitting a lot of massive potholes. In the upper atmosphere, climate change basically amplifies those variations, so that the upper-level jet stream flows faster - but at lower levels, global warming in the arctic weakens the temperature gradient and therefore also the jet stream. And the clear-air part, well that basically means you don't really see it coming like you would a storm and often come as a surprise to pilots.
We All Need to Be More Down to Earth
Now it's not that we're all at a huge risk of crashing out of the sky on our next vacation, but more so that passengers will continue to feel more discomfort while flying and arrive later than expected more often. And the bumpier flights shouldn't be mistaken for a fun little rollercoaster ride either, as an example, planes in the grip of turbulence can drop 100 feet in a second, leading to potentially severe consequences. Just this week 1 passenger died and 20 were injured due to severe turbulence on a Singapore Airlines flight from London to Singapore.
The birth of the aircraft has made the planet feel much smaller than it really is, and in many ways, made us feel like we're on top of the world. But I can assure you, when you're 35,000 feet up in the air and your plane unexpectedly drops a few hundred feet, you'll come back down to Earth quick, and hopefully pledge to make better decisions when you're back on land.
