In general, turbulence is harmless. In 99.9 percent of all cases, nothing happens and nobody is injured. Turbulence to an airplane is pretty much what waves are to a boat - harmless. However, sometimes severe turbulence occurs unexpectedly and then it can cause severe injuries; like today when a United 777 en route from London to LA encountered severe and unexpected turbulence over the Atlantic.
As a matter of fact, only those people who do not have their seat belts fastened suffer injuries whenever planes hit turbulence. When a plane drops (sometimes incorrectly called "air pockets"), they get pulled out of their seats, hit the ceiling and are sometimes even thrown against other passengers. Every year, dozens of people are injured because they don't wear their seat belts while on a plane. So it is extremely important to wear seat belts whenever seated and throughout the entire flight. Even pilots can sometimes not tell if they are about to hit rough air. In contrast to clouds or thunderstorms, wind in clear air (so-called clear-air turbulence) cannot be detected, not even by state-of-the art instruments. You just never know. And exactly that happened on the United flight today. Ten people on board were injured and the Boeing 777-200 had to make an emergency landing in Montreal.
CNN reported that the plane is also being checked for possible damage. This is highly unlikely. Airlines usually do those checks, just to be on the safe side, but turbulence is generally not strong enough to cause real damage to a plane. Planes are built to withstand the worst of all possible circumstances. It is impossible for wind, or even storms, that occur in reality to cause damage to a plane. Damage is, however, caused by people falling around the cabin and hitting the cabin ceiling. For a plane to be allowed to take off again with passengers, this damage needs to be corrected.
To read the CNN story, please click here.
Again, a United 777-200 hit severe turbulence, injuring 30 passengers on Tuesday. The long-haul aircraft was en route from Dulles to Los Angeles when it flew into sudden turbulence over the Rocky Mountains. Flight UA 967 was eventually diverted to Denver, Colorado, where injured people were treated.
