Following the news earlier this week when a Singapore Airlines jet was hit by “sudden extreme turbulence” over Myanmar’s Irrawaddy Basin at 37,000ft about 10 hours after take off.
It saw the death of a British man Geoffrey Kitchen, 73, who had suffered a suspected heart attack on board.
Mr Kitchen’s friend, Lizzie Atkins explained to the BBC that he was on the flight with his wife and the couple had been planning to go on a cruise in Indonesia before travelling to Australia.
As much as turbulence is a pretty scary thing in itself and something that is out of our control it is no wonder some people are put off by flying.
However, let’s remember that turbulence is a common thing and is something pilots often have to deal with when flying a plane.
So what exactly is turbulence?
It turns out there are different types that you can experience. However, most turbulence takes place when the plane is in the clouds.
Although it is fairly mild, movements of air cause different levels of turbulence.
There is also clear air turbulence which can make it harder to detect signs of turbulence incoming. This takes place around the jet stream and can be found at 40,000-60,000ft up in the air.
But did you know certain parts of the world experience turbulence more than others?
Research from Turbli, are turbulence forecast website, looked at over 150,000 long and short-haul flight records from 2023.
They used ‘eddy dissipation rates’ which measure turbulence at a given moment and can range from 0-100.
The researchers found Santiago, Chile and Santa Cruz, Bolivia as the most turbulent flight routes in the world with an average EDR of 17.5.
Meanwhile, the most turbulent in Europe was Milan to Geneva having an EDR record of 16.3 EDR.
Here are the 10 most turbulent flight routes in the world, according to Turbli.
Santiago (SCL) – Santa Cruz (VVI)
Almaty (ALA) – Bishkek (FRU)
Lanzhou (LHW) – Chengdu (CTU)
Centrair (NGO) – Sendai (SDJ)
Milan (MXP) – Geneva (GVA)
Lanzhou (LHW) – Xianyang (XIY)
Osaka (KIX) – Sendai (SDJ)
Xianyang (XIY) – Chengdu (CTU)
Xianyang (XIY) – Chongqing (CKG)
Milan (MXP) – Zurich (ZRH)
Meanwhile, here are the most turbulent flight routes in Europe
Milan (MXP) – Geneva (GVA)
Milan (MXP) – Zurich (ZRH)
Geneva (GVA) – Zurich (ZRH)
Marseille (MRS) – Zurich (ZRH)
Zgornji Brnik (LJU) – Zurich (ZRH)
Nice (NCE) – Basel (BSL)
Nice (NCE) – Zurich (ZRH)
Yerevan (EVN) – Tbilisi (TBS)
Basel (BSL) – Venezia (VCE)
Frankfurt am Main (FRA) – Caselle Torinese (TRN)