Multiple Injured as Rough Air Strikes Delta Plane Arriving in Sydney

Multiple passengers and crew sustained injuries when a Delta Airlines flight originating in Los Angeles to Sydney, Australia was hit by turbulence on Friday morning.

The flight, numbered 41 "experienced a brief period of turbulence" as it touched down at the Sydney airport, a company official told. Four flight attendants were injured.

The New South Wales Ambulance Service stated they evaluated five patients, and took three of them to the hospital with relatively minor issues that included back pain and head pain. Those affected were between their thirties and seventies.

The event represents the latest incident of planes experiencing severe turbulence, with aviation specialists saying that global warming is a significant contributor.

The aircraft was carrying 245 passengers and fifteen staff members on the aircraft, the official said, adding that the plane touched down "safely and normally" at the airport at shortly before 7 a.m. on Friday.

Paramedics indicated they got a call just a mere three minutes ahead of the plane landed, and emergency vehicles were standing by on the runway.

Why in-flight bumpiness is becoming more common - and often stronger.

In the previous year, two dozen individuals were injured when a separate Delta aircraft, flying from Salt Lake City to Amsterdam, Netherlands, experienced "significant" turbulence just a couple of hours into the transoceanic journey, and was forced to make an unscheduled landing.

Recently, those on board on a certain international flight experienced a terrifying brief five-second of severe turbulence. One passenger died and many were hurt, as individuals not fastened in lifted out of their seats and fell back down.

Bumpy air is a common occurrence on aircraft journeys, and while instances of strong or severe turbulence seem to be rising, they are still very rare.

Data suggests that there are around 5,000 incidents of severe or worse turbulence each year, out of a total of over 35 million journeys that now take off worldwide.

Intense turbulence is categorized as when the sudden jolts of a aircraft experiencing disturbed air apply in excess of 1.5g-force on your body - enough to throw you from your seat if you did not have on a restraint.

As global warming modifies weather patterns, specialists caution that air travel could become less smooth: shifts in temperature and altered air currents in the jet stream level are expected to boost the occurrence and strength of dangerous in-flight bumps.