A Number of Hurt as In-Flight Disturbance Impacts A Delta Airlines Plane Arriving in Sydney, Australia

Several people sustained injuries following a Delta aircraft from Los Angeles to Sydney encountered turbulence this past Friday.

Delta Flight 41 "went through a short bout of rough air" as it landed at the Sydney airport, an airline spokesperson stated. A number of the onboard staff required medical attention.

The New South Wales Ambulance Service stated they assessed a total of five people, and took a trio to the hospital with minor injuries that such as back pain and migraines. The injured were between their thirties and seventies.

This marks the newest example of planes being hit by severe turbulence, with researchers indicating that global warming is a major factor.

On board were 245 passengers and 15 crew members on the wide-body jet, the Delta spokesperson added, adding that the plane arrived "without further incident" at Sydney Airport at 06:48 local time on Friday morning.

The NSW Ambulance Service said they got a call just a mere three minutes ahead of the plane arrived, and emergency vehicles were waiting on the tarmac.

The reasons turbulence is growing more common - and more severe.

Last year, two dozen individuals sustained injuries when a separate Delta aircraft, flying from Salt Lake City to Amsterdam, hit "severe" atmospheric disturbance just 120 minutes into the transoceanic journey, and was forced to make an emergency landing.

Recently, passengers and crew on a Singapore Airlines jet went through a frightening brief five-second period of extreme instability. One passenger lost their life and numerous people sustained injuries, as individuals not fastened in lifted out of their seats and were slammed back.

Bumpy air is a common occurrence on aircraft journeys, and while occurrences of rough conditions seem to be rising, they are still very rare.

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

Severe turbulence is described as when the sudden jolts of a plane experiencing rough air masses generate in excess of 1.5 times the force of gravity on your body - enough to throw you from your seat if you did not have on a seatbelt.

As climate change shifts the conditions in the sky, experts warn that commercial aviation could become bumpier: temperature changes and altered air currents in the jet stream level are projected to heighten the regularity and severity of dangerous in-flight bumps.