Multiple Injured as Rough Air Impacts Delta Aircraft Landing at Sydney

Several people were hurt after a Delta aircraft originating in LA to Sydney experienced rough air Friday morning.

The flight, numbered 41 "experienced a brief period of turbulence" as it touched down at Sydney Airport, a company official told. Four flight attendants sustained injuries.

The New South Wales Ambulance Service said they evaluated five patients, and took three of them to a medical facility with relatively minor issues that included spinal discomfort and headaches. The patients' ages were between their thirties and seventies.

The event represents the newest example of aircraft being hit by severe turbulence, with researchers saying that global warming is a major factor.

On board were nearly 250 travelers and 15 crew members on the wide-body jet, the Delta spokesperson added, stating that the plane arrived "without further incident" at Sydney Airport at 06:48 local time on the day in question.

Paramedics said they got a call just only 180 seconds ahead of the plane landed, and ambulances were standing by on the runway.

Why in-flight bumpiness is getting more common - and potentially more dangerous.

In the previous year, twenty-five passengers and crew sustained injuries when another Delta jet, travelling from Salt Lake City to Amsterdam, Netherlands, encountered "significant" rough air just 120 minutes into the transoceanic journey, and diverted for an unscheduled landing.

Recently, those on board on a Singapore Airlines jet experienced a harrowing brief five-second bout of severe turbulence. A traveler lost their life and numerous people sustained injuries, as unbelted passengers were thrown from their seats and fell back down.

Turbulence is not uncommon during flights, and while cases of significant turbulence seem to be rising, they are still very rare.

Research indicates that there are around thousands of instances of severe or worse turbulence annually, out of a overall number of more than 35 million journeys that currently occur globally.

Intense turbulence is categorized as when the up and down movements of a aircraft experiencing unstable air exert in excess of 1.5g-force on your body - a strong enough force to throw you from your seat if you weren't wearing a seatbelt.

As global warming alters atmospheric conditions, experts warn that air travel could become more turbulent: shifts in temperature and altered air currents in the upper atmosphere are expected to heighten the regularity and severity of severe turbulence.