Multiple Hurt as Turbulence Strikes A Delta Airlines Plane Landing at Sydney

Multiple passengers and crew sustained injuries when a Delta Airlines jet from Los Angeles to Sydney, Australia was hit by turbulence this past Friday.

Flight DL41 "encountered brief turbulence" as it landed at the Sydney airport, an airline spokesperson stated. Four flight attendants were injured.

Emergency medical services reported they treated five patients, and transferred three of them to a medical facility with non-life-threatening injuries that comprised back pain and head pain. The patients' ages ranged from their 30s up to the 70s.

It is the most recent case of aircraft experiencing turbulence, with aviation specialists saying that climate change is a key driver.

On board were nearly 250 travelers and fifteen staff members on the wide-body jet, the official said, clarifying that the plane touched down "safely and normally" at Sydney Airport at 6:48 a.m. local time on the day in question.

The NSW Ambulance Service indicated they got a call just only 180 seconds ahead of the plane touched down, and ambulances were waiting on the tarmac.

Why in-flight bumpiness is getting increasingly prevalent - and more severe.

In the previous year, two dozen individuals were injured when a separate Delta aircraft, on a route from Salt Lake City to Amsterdam, Netherlands, experienced "severe" turbulence just two hours into the lengthy trip, and diverted for an precautionary landing.

Earlier this year, those on board on a certain international flight went through a frightening five seconds of severe turbulence. An individual died and many were hurt, as those without seatbelts lifted out of their seats and crashed back down.

In-flight turbulence is fairly routine while flying, and while cases of strong or severe turbulence seem to be rising, they are still very rare.

Estimates show that there are an estimated thousands of instances of severe or worse turbulence annually, out of a overall number of in excess of 35 million flights that currently occur around the world.

Intense turbulence is described as when the sudden jolts of a plane passing through disturbed air generate in excess of a significant G-force on your body - a strong enough force to throw you from your seat if you weren't wearing a restraint.

As a changing climate shifts the conditions in the sky, specialists caution that commercial aviation could become less smooth: temperature changes and changing jet streams in the jet stream level are projected to boost the regularity and severity of dangerous in-flight bumps.