What exactly is turbulence, and is it at all an indication of danger during a flight?
In: Physics
Turbulence is not dangerous to the aircraft at all. The only danger that turbulence poses is for the squishy bits inside the plane. Particularly any of them that aren’t wearing their seatbelts.
For a description of turbulence think of it just like waves in the water. Sometimes the water is smooth. Sometimes it’s bumpy. And usually the smoothness or bumpiness is caused by wind (or a lack thereof). Turbulence is similar. If your plane is flying in an airmass with a 100 knot tailwind and then suddenly (over the course of 10-20 miles or so) that wind changes to a 100 knot crosswind you’re going to most likely feel some bumps.
There are other causes of turbulence as well. During summer months turbulence can be created closer to the ground by daytime heating. The sun heats up the ground and the ground heats up the air close to it. Hot air rises and you have turbulence due to day time heating. Imagine a pot of water as it’s just about to boil. Again though, it’s not dangerous.
Another type of turbulence is wake turbulence. As planes fly through the air they disturb the air they’re travelling through. Just like the wake behind a boat. This type of turbulence can be severe in short bursts and it’s the reason we have separation requirements between aircraft. Wake dissipates relatively quickly so 6-7 miles of separation is typically enough.
Lastly another type of turbulence can be caused by orographic lift. Which is another way to say mountains cause turbulence. Depending on the direction of the mountain range, and the direction that the wind is coming from a mountain range can cause some significant turbulence. And this can continue up to 200 miles past the mountain range. I’ve encountered this numerous times flying over The Rockies. It’s not dangerous and it typically doesn’t last too long.
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