Scientists believe climate change will cause much more violent turbulence of the sort that broke the leg of a Turkish Airlines flight attendant this weekend and sent 28 passengers to the hospital. "The prevalence of transatlantic wintertime clear-air turbulence will increase significantly in all aviation-relevant strength categories as the climate changes," Williams writes in a 2017 study that examines climate change's effects on turbulence in the North Atlantic corridor, the world's busiest oceanic airspace. That number is likely to increase as air traffic increases—it has been growing by 5 percent per year—and as turbulence worsens. Since Williams' 2017 study, he and other scientists expanded their scope to eight global regions regularly traversed by aircraft and found that some will see turbulence increase by several hundred percent. Climate change is also increasing the speed of the jet stream, Williams says, which means speedier east-bound flights but slower west-bound, resulting in slower flying time and higher carbon emissions overall.

Source: Forbes March 11, 2019 03:56 UTC