Climate change is making plane turbulence worse

It’s pretty common to experience mild turbulence while flying, which usually results in nothing more than a bumpy ride. However, lately it seems that it’s getting way worse, to the point of being dangerous. And according to experts, climate change is to blame.

On average, there have been more storms, and an increase in hurricanes that rapidly intensify, according to NASA Climate Change.

But while storms can sometimes be detected and avoided, jet streams and wind shear, the main culprits of clear-air turbulence, can not, experts say.

Photo: Emanuel/Unsplash

Clear-air turbulence, so named because it’s not part of any storm system and therefore isn’t visualized before a plane flies into it, can be “wildly problematic”, according to Williams.

Photo: Kevin Woblick/Unsplash

Changing global temperatures have already increased wind shear by 15% since 1979, according to PubMed research.

Smith explained the increase in greenhouse gasses traps heat in the troposphere (the layer of the atmosphere closest to the surface), that should have been released into the stratosphere, which is the next layer up.

As a result, the troposphere warms while the stratosphere cools at a rapid rate, “increasing the temperature gradient between the two layers, which strengthens the jet stream, creating a more unstable wind flow and increasing clear-air turbulence," Smith said.

Photo: Nikhil Mitra/Unsplash

Weather researchers further predict clear-air turbulence will double by 2050, with severe turbulence increasing the most, according to research published by the American Geophysical Union.

"Even considering the impacts of climate change, it's actually likely that flights will become safer over time as opposed to more dangerous," said Stephen Bennett, chairman of the American Meteorological Society's Committee on Financial Weather and Climate Risk, to Insider.