I hate flying with passion and get extremely scared when flying through turbulences but, there was a journalist in my country, that also had experience as a pilot and said once on TV that during turbulences, is one of the safest moments in a plane. I don't remember the reasons but is there anybody in here with knowledge in the field that could confirm/deny this?
Is Clear Air Turbulence becoming more common?
31–40 of 163 posts
Re: Is Clear Air Turbulence becoming more common?
#32I hate flying with passion and get extremely scared when flying through turbulences but, there was a journalist in my country, that also had experience as a pilot and said once on TV that during turbulences, is one of the safest moments in a plane. I don't remember the reasons but is there anybody in here with knowledge in the field that could confirm/deny this?
Do you recall why they said it was the safest? My first guess is because the pilots are paying more attention while flying through turbulence.
Re: Is Clear Air Turbulence becoming more common?
#33This does not seem to be borne out by the accident statistics, which apparently show no trend in turbulence related accidents. ( https://www.ntsb.gov/safety/safety-studies/Documents/SS2101.... ) I don't know if there are other factors which might be masking a rise in incidence of CAT from accident stats?
Also, they just looked at 2 years, so there could be cherry picking. Jet stream is affected by el nino. 1979 was weak el nino, 2020 was moderate la nina.
Re: Is Clear Air Turbulence becoming more common?
#34I hate flying with passion and get extremely scared when flying through turbulences but, there was a journalist in my country, that also had experience as a pilot and said once on TV that during turbulences, is one of the safest moments in a plane. I don't remember the reasons but is there anybody in here with knowledge in the field that could confirm/deny this?
It is safe because you are flying. Airplanes almost never have issues at altitude. Problems occur when closer to the ground. Landing/takeoff are the most dangerous times, the transitions between flying and not flying.
Re: Is Clear Air Turbulence becoming more common?
#35> The Prosser report outlines one of the primary reasons for the increase in CAT events as the intensification of the jet streams, driven by the warming of the planet. As global temperatures rise, the temperature gradients between the equator and the poles become more pronounced, strengthening the jet streams and increasing the likelihood of turbulence . I was under the impression that, as the poles are MORE affected…
That’s also what I read: The poles warm FASTER than the equator. Thus, the global temperature gradients are getting smaller. And as a result, not only does the Jetstream weaken: as a result, weather patterns become more stable which leads to greater continuous periods of draught or flooding.
> The poles warm FASTER than the equator
The article cites the Prosser Report which contradicts this claim, but I find it hard to understand how this could be true for very long. Why wouldn't the atmosphere stabilize as gradients diminish?
Re: Is Clear Air Turbulence becoming more common?
#36This does not seem to be borne out by the accident statistics, which apparently show no trend in turbulence related accidents. ( https://www.ntsb.gov/safety/safety-studies/Documents/SS2101.... ) I don't know if there are other factors which might be masking a rise in incidence of CAT from accident stats?
Yeah, you should have more concern over human error and Boeing than this. But, boy, the more I have flown and the older I am, the more I get anxious during turbulence when I fly.
Re: Is Clear Air Turbulence becoming more common?
#37I hate flying with passion and get extremely scared when flying through turbulences but, there was a journalist in my country, that also had experience as a pilot and said once on TV that during turbulences, is one of the safest moments in a plane. I don't remember the reasons but is there anybody in here with knowledge in the field that could confirm/deny this?
Do you recall why they said it was the safest? My first guess is because the pilots are paying more attention while flying through turbulence.
My first guess is that during turbulence everyone has their seatbelt on. No one is walking around the cabin. It’s only at the start of unexpected turbulence that anyone should get hurt. Once your seatbelt is on things have to get pretty bad to get hurt.
Re: Is Clear Air Turbulence becoming more common?
#38I hate flying with passion and get extremely scared when flying through turbulences but, there was a journalist in my country, that also had experience as a pilot and said once on TV that during turbulences, is one of the safest moments in a plane. I don't remember the reasons but is there anybody in here with knowledge in the field that could confirm/deny this?
That's just not true. No turbulence is better than turbulence.
That said, experiencing light chop on a modern large airplane presents no danger to the airframe or properly secured passengers. You really should be strapped in, though, especially if you're on a small plane. Wake turbulence, for example, actually does present a significant risk to smaller aircraft.
Re: Is Clear Air Turbulence becoming more common?
#39This does not seem to be borne out by the accident statistics, which apparently show no trend in turbulence related accidents. ( https://www.ntsb.gov/safety/safety-studies/Documents/SS2101.... ) I don't know if there are other factors which might be masking a rise in incidence of CAT from accident stats?
Well, assuming that there is indeed more turbulence, that could also mean more vigilance against accidents, so that could even itself out as safety regulations get stricter than in the past. Also, this is mentioned in the conclusions:
> The report includes an important discussion of the risk to unrestrained occupants onboard aircraft, including flight attendants – who account for nearly 80% of those seriously injured in turbulence-related accidents. Key recommendations in the report are intended to help ensure better protections for flight attendants
... which makes me think of two more possibilities:
1 - I suspect any careless flight attendant involved in a turbulence-related accident would learn their lesson after the first time, and take better safety precautions. Perhaps that is a stabilizing factor on the number of accidents, since the number of flight attendants who need to learn that lesson the hard way is probably more a function of how many new flight attendants enter the field than it is a product of how much turbulence there is.
2 - Flight attendants under-report minor accidents so they don't get into trouble for not respecting safety rules
Of course, this is pure speculation (and assuming that the premise of there being more CAT incidents holds up), I'm sure the actual document goes into this kind of thing in more detail but I don't have the time to dig through 115 papers.
Re: Is Clear Air Turbulence becoming more common?
#40> The Prosser report outlines one of the primary reasons for the increase in CAT events as the intensification of the jet streams, driven by the warming of the planet. As global temperatures rise, the temperature gradients between the equator and the poles become more pronounced, strengthening the jet streams and increasing the likelihood of turbulence . I was under the impression that, as the poles are MORE affected…
You might be thinking of the Gulf Stream, which is an oceanic current and definitively weakening, rather than the jet stream, which is an air current.
The jet stream is getting stronger (and its path becomes more erratic), but the reasoning provided in the article is simplified to the point of being wrong.
The projected warming at the North Pole is much stronger than the projected warming at the equator, decreasing the temperature gradient. However the moisture carrying capacity of air increases exponentially with temperature. Since the equator starts warmer, a given change in temperature has a bigger effect on moisture carrying capacity. It turns out that heating up the equator by one degree Celsius and the North Pole by 2 degrees Celsius increases the moisture capacity gradient, despite the temperature gradient dropping. And that increasing moisture capacity gradient strengthens the jet stream.
(at least that's the intuitive reason they were probably going for. In reality there are many factors and a good bit of "if we simulate it this keeps happening")