Several Hurt as Rough Air Impacts A Delta Airlines Plane Landing at Sydney

Multiple passengers and crew have been injured after a Delta Airlines aircraft from LA to Sydney, Australia experienced turbulence this past Friday.

Flight DL41 "experienced a brief period of turbulence" as it touched down at the Sydney airport, a company official told. Several cabin crew members required medical attention.

Local paramedics stated they evaluated five patients, and took a trio to a medical facility with relatively minor issues that comprised back pain and headaches. Those affected ranged from their thirties and seventies.

This marks the latest incident of planes being hit by atmospheric disturbance, with researchers pointing out that global warming is a major factor.

There were nearly 250 travelers and 15 crew members on the aircraft, the Delta spokesperson said, stating that the plane landed "without further incident" at Sydney Airport at shortly before 7 a.m. on the day in question.

Emergency responders reported they were alerted just a mere three minutes before the plane touched down, and emergency vehicles were standing by on the runway.

Why in-flight bumpiness is becoming more common - and more severe.

Last year, twenty-five passengers and crew sustained injuries when a separate Delta aircraft, on a route from Salt Lake City to Amsterdam, hit "significant" rough air just 120 minutes into the lengthy trip, and had to make an unscheduled landing.

Earlier this year, passengers and crew on a Singapore Airlines jet experienced a terrifying five seconds period of extreme instability. An individual passed away and many were hurt, as unbelted passengers lifted out of their seats and crashed back down.

Turbulence is not uncommon during flights, and while cases of strong or severe turbulence are reportedly becoming more frequent, they are still very rare.

Estimates show that there are approximately five thousand cases of severe or worse turbulence each year, out of a overall number of over 35 million journeys that are conducted worldwide.

Severe turbulence is categorized as when the sudden jolts of a jet passing through rough air masses exert in excess of 1.5g-force on your body - a strong enough force to throw you from your seat if you weren't wearing a seatbelt.

As climate change shifts the conditions in the sky, specialists caution that flying could become bumpier: shifts in temperature and changing jet streams in the higher altitudes are expected to increase the occurrence and strength of severe turbulence.