Several Affected as Turbulence Strikes Delta Plane Arriving in Sydney, Australia

Multiple passengers and crew have been injured when a Delta flight originating in LA to Sydney was hit by turbulence this past Friday.

Flight DL41 "experienced a brief period of turbulence" as it touched down at the Sydney airport, an airline spokesperson told. Several cabin crew members were injured.

Local paramedics reported they assessed a total of five people, and transported three of them to a medical facility with relatively minor issues that such as spinal discomfort and head pain. The injured were between their thirties and seventies.

It is the latest incident of commercial jets experiencing atmospheric disturbance, with experts saying that shifting climate patterns is a major factor.

The aircraft was carrying nearly 250 travelers and a crew of 15 on the aircraft, the official added, clarifying that the plane touched down "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 prior to the plane touched down, and emergency vehicles were standing by on the runway.

Why plane turbulence is growing increasingly prevalent - and potentially more dangerous.

Last year, 25 people were injured when another Delta jet, flying from Salt Lake City to Amsterdam, Netherlands, hit "significant" turbulence just two hours into the transoceanic journey, and had to make an emergency landing.

Earlier this year, passengers and crew on a Singapore Airlines jet went through a terrifying brief five-second of severe turbulence. An individual passed away and many were hurt, as individuals not fastened in rose out of their seats and were slammed back.

Turbulence is not uncommon while flying, and while occurrences of rough conditions seem to be rising, they are statistically infrequent.

Research indicates that there are an estimated thousands of instances of severe-or-greater turbulence each year, out of a sum of more than 35 million flights that now take off globally.

Severe turbulence is described as when the sudden jolts of a plane passing through unstable air exert more than 1.5g-force on your body - enough to throw you from your seat if you weren't wearing a safety belt.

As climate change shifts atmospheric conditions, specialists caution that commercial aviation could become less smooth: temperature changes and shifting wind patterns in the jet stream level are expected to boost the regularity and severity of significant turbulence.