Bad News for Nervous Fliers: Climate Change Is Making Severe Turbulence More Common

Incidents of severe air turbulence are on the rise and there will be worse to come as climate change takes hold, scientists have warned.

Last month a United Airlines flight from Houston, Texas to London Heathrow was forced to make an emergency landing at Shannon Airport in Ireland after severe turbulence left 16 passengers needing hospital treatment.
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On the face of it, incidents like these might seem to have little to do with climate change, but scientists say these narratives are intrinsically linked.

“When we think of global warming we’re usually thinking about the fact that it’s getting warmer at ground level, but in fact the temperatures are changing higher up in the atmosphere including where planes fly at 35,000ft,” said Dr Paul Williams, an atmospheric scientist at the University of Reading.

“The atmospheric winds and temperatures up there are very strongly tied together and therefore the winds are changing in response to the temperature temperatures.

“As the climate changes the odds of encountering turbulence on your flight are increasing.” 

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