New data has revealed the most turbulent flight routes across the globe from over 150,000 long-haul and short-haul flight records. According to the turbulence forecast website, Turbli , two short-haul flights across Europe are among the world's top 10 most turbulent flights. The hour-long hopper flights between Milan-Geneva and Milan-Zurich have featured fifth and tenth on the list respectively.
Taking the top spot was a 1,905km trip between Santiago in Chile and Santa Cruz in Bolivia. The recent rankings follow the death of a 73-year-old Brit , who was onboard a Singapore Airlines flight when it experienced extreme turbulence. The Boeing 777 jet hit an air pocket and sharply dropped 6,000ft in five minutes, before making an emergency landing at Bangkok airport in Thailand.
The plane was carrying 211 passengers and 18 crew members. The flight path with the worst turbulence scored EDR 17.5 ( Image: Getty Images) While turbulence is usually not harmful and is a regular occurrence on long-haul flights, the sudden rising and dropping of a plane can cause injury to passengers and crew, as well as damage the aircraft itself.
Disturbance is usually ranked on a scale from 'light' to 'severe'. Turbli used 'eddy dissipation rates' (EDR) to rank the flights. EDR measures the intensity of turbulence at a given spot.
For example, 0-20 is light turbulence, whereas 80-100 is extreme turbulence. At the top of the list is the 1,905km route between Santiago, Chile, to Viru Viru International A.