Nightmare turbulence on a Singapore Airlines flight
A Singapore Airlines flight hit severe turbulence on Tuesday, flinging passengers and crew around the cabin and forcing the plane to land in Bangkok, officials and the airline said. One passenger, a 73-year-old British man, died from a suspected heart attack and a local hospital said they are treating 71 people for injuries.
The flight from London and bound for Singapore fell into an air pocket while cabin crew were serving breakfast before it encountered severe turbulence. The plane dropped 6,000 feet in about three minutes. Passengers who were not wearing their seatbelts were immediately launched into the air, one eyewitness told Reuters. They hit so hard they dented and even punched through some of the light panels over the seats.
British passenger Andrew Davies told Sky News that the seatbelt sign was illuminated but crew members didn’t have time to take their seats. “Every single cabin crew person I saw was injured in some way or another, maybe with a gash on their head,” Davies said. “One had a bad back, who was in obvious pain.”
The Boeing 777 flight from London’s Heathrow airport to Singapore had 211 passengers and 18 crew members aboard. The airline released a statement that the nationalities of the passengers: 56 were from Australia, two from Canada, one from Germany, three from India, two from Indonesia, one from Iceland, four from Ireland, one from Israel, 16 from Malaysia, two from Myanmar, 23 from New Zealand, five from the Philippines, 41 from Singapore, one from South Korea, two from Spain, 47 from the United Kingdom and four were from the U.S.
Thailand’s transport minister, Suriya Jungrungruangkit, said Singapore was dispatching another plane to transport about 100 passengers who were not injured. The Bangkok airport general manager described them as being in a state of shock.
According to The Associated Press, while most people associate turbulence with heavy storms, the most dangerous type is so-called clear air turbulence. Wind shear can occur in wispy cirrus clouds or even in clear air near thunderstorms, as differences in temperature and pressure create powerful currents of fast-moving air.
Deaths caused by turbulence are rare. Between 2009 and 2021, 146 passengers and crew members were seriously injured in turbulence, according to data from the Federal Aviation Administration. In December 2022, 11 people were seriously hurt in turbulence on a flight from Phoenix to Honolulu.
Singapore Airlines is one of the world’s top-ranked airlines, reports The Washington Post, and has had a “robust safety record.” Its last major incident was in 2000, when a flight took off from the wrong runway in Taiwan, crashing into construction equipment and killing 83 people on board.
In today’s second statement, the airline said it offered “its deepest condolences to the family of the deceased. We deeply apologize for the traumatic experience that our passengers and crew members suffered on this flight. We are providing all necessary assistance during this difficult time.” Chee Hong Tat, Singapore’s minister for transport, said in a statement that he was “deeply saddened to learn about the incident.” Boeing also extended condolences to the family of the man who died and said it was in contact with Singapore Airlines, ready to support them. Singapore’s Transport Safety Investigation Bureau will be deploying investigators to Bangkok to look into the incident.
