Passenger behavior can be key to preventing injuries, as two recent airline incidents have shown.
To be specific, always wear a seatbelt in case of sudden turbulence, and leave your bags behind in an emergency evacuation.
On Wednesday, 25 people were injured after a Delta Air Lines plane encountered “significant” turbulence while flying over Wyoming, the airline said.
Flight 56 diverted to Minnesota and landed safely, but over two dozen people were taken to nearby hospitals.
Turbulence can appear suddenly and isn’t always detected by onboard radar systems, so there may not be time for the pilots to put on the seatbelt sign.
“It’s essentially like taking a box with something in it and starting to shake the box up and down,” Guy Gratton, an associate professor of aviation and the environment at Cranfield University, previously told Business Insider.
“If you’re the person who’s inside the box, then you get thrown around inside the box, and that’s where injuries happen.”
“Passengers are told to keep their seatbelts done up because if you’re tied to the box, you’re much less likely to get injured,” he added.
Plus, turbulence is getting more common as a result of the climate crisis
Warmer temperatures allow the atmosphere to hold more moisture, increasing the likelihood and intensity of thunderstorms.
Clear-air turbulence, which occurs near jet streams, is also becoming stronger and more frequent due to changes in the atmosphere.
In 2023, researchers at the University of Reading in the UK found that severe air turbulence had increased 55% over a typical point in the North Atlantic Ocean between 1979 and 2020.
Leave your bags behind in an evacuation
Last Saturday, an American Airlines flight was evacuated at Denver International Airport when a landing gear caught fire before takeoff.
The airline said that all 173 passengers and six crew members on board were safely evacuated from the aircraft, while one person was taken to a hospital with minor injuries.
However, a video of the incident showed passengers carrying their luggage as they went down the emergency slides.
The Federal Aviation Administration warns on its website that “retrieving personal items may impede the safe evacuation of passengers.”
Aviation expert Geoffrey Thomas previously told BI how this can cause bottlenecks on board, slowing down the evacuation.
“You’ve got to get all the passengers out in 90 seconds,” he said. “Now, we’re seeing evacuations taking six and seven minutes because passengers insist on taking their bags.”
When a Japan Airlines Airbus A350 caught fire after colliding with another plane last January, all 379 people on board survived after evacuating in time.
Under safety rules, planemakers have to show that an aircraft can be evacuated in only 90 seconds with only half the exits available.
“Bear in mind that such tests do not take place in a high-stress environment,” Graham Braithwaite, an expert on flight safety at Cranfield University, told BI at the time.
The airline’s in-flight safety video was also praised for its clear evacuation instructions, and reminding passengers to leave their bags behind.
Not all fires end the same way.
In 2019, an Aeroflot plane caught fire after an emergency landing in Moscow, and 41 of the 78 people on board died.
Experts criticized passengers who evacuated with their carry-on luggage, suggesting it may have contributed to the death count.
While there were no fatalities in the American Airlines and Delta Air Lines incidents over the past week, both are stark reminders of how things can go wrong if safety rules aren’t followed.
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