What exactly is turbulence, and is it at all an indication of danger during a flight?
In: Physics
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How weather planes fly into hurricanes and hold up?
Someone once explained it to me as similar as going over bumps and bouncing a little in your car which doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll crash.
My turbulence story – years ago – big storms up and down the US East Coast, and I’m flying from Florida to NYC.
Flights are being cancelled everywhere, and we passengers are sitting at the gate, waiting to board. The gate agent announces, “Our pilot says that if we can take off in the next 20 minutes, they *have* to let us land in New York.”
Well, the slammed us into the plane and we took off. Let me tell you, the last 45 minutes into Kennedy, I think it was, was a Nantucket Sleigh Ride in the sky.Holy %3$!?*. FAs were strapped in and not getting up for *nothin’*!
That’s the only time I’ve been worried on a plane.
But, he was right – they *had* to let us land, and they did!
https://vm.tiktok.com/ZM6qJbL3y/
Can any other pilots confirm this comparison?
How do pilots know when the turbulence is going to hit? They always have a heads up. Previous flights using the same path, or displays?
A turbulence is not a danger to the plane but a danger to the passenger. The plane can suddenly lose a couple feet abruptly so that means everything that is not tied to the plane goes up. You can smash your head badly on the ceiling in the worst case.
I think of it like being in the ocean. When you swim you experience waves or resistance. The only difference in the air is you can’t see the “waves.” The plane should be able to withstand this at a baseline level 🙂
Air is chaotic. It has unpredictable currents and areas of differing densities. Since planes rely on the comparative windspeed between the top and bottom surfaces of their wings to generate lift, these chaotic conditions cause lift to vary across the span of the wing causing vibrations and jolts.
Passenger planes can withstand an enormous amount of turbulence with no significant impact on safety. The seat belt signs are mostly to stop people from tripping over one another or banging their heads on the ceiling.
We hit a typhoon when I was flying back from Japan, the turbulence was bad enough that the plane would be in free fall for several seconds at a time. Everything was fine.
Why does the plane feel like it’s dropping like 500 feet during severe turbulence. Seriously we hit severe turbulence once and it sounded like something impacted the belly of the plane and it felt like we all DROPPED in altitude (like that pit you get in Rollercoaster).
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