Dec 20, 2024 • 7 min read
How a changed climate has affected travel this year
01.12.2024 - 17:39 / thepointsguy.com
There's no denying how extreme weather affects travel. Travelers see delayed and canceled flights due to winter storms, hurricanes, wildfires and even turbulence.
These issues add more money and time to your travel experience, increasing frustration overall with an inherently stressful process, even on the best days.
The bad news is that weather continues to make travel more expensive, and frankly, there's nothing you can do about that. But there are some ways you can at least ease the stress.
As reported in 2023, turbulence is increasing on commercial flights due to more extreme weather affected by global warming. This has led to more time on the ground due to flight delays and more time spent in the air as airlines try to avoid turbulence through diverted flight paths.
The most recent data from the National Transportation Safety Board and the Federal Aviation Administration attributes nearly 40% of all accidents on large commercial airlines from 2009 to 2018 to turbulence.
Clear air turbulence or non-convective turbulence is most concerning for travelers. It develops around jet streams, which are "fast-flowing bands of wind that propagate around the globe," Isabel Smith, a Ph.D. student at the University of Reading, said. Smith warns that this type of turbulence will increase with climate change as jet streams strengthen with global warming.
"Clear air is projected to increase with climate change because jet streams are strengthening with global warming," she said. "Aircraft flying at their cruising heights (30 to 40 thousand feet from the surface) can be struck suddenly from clear air without warning, resulting in damages and injuries."
Smith uses high-resolution climate models to predict increases in atmospheric turbulence.
"Airlines try to avoid turbulence as much as they can, which often leads to longer flights and longer wait times," she said. "As a result, airlines use more fuel and, therefore, emit more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere."
The resulting financial burden borne by the domestic aviation industry from convoluted flight routes is twofold — not to mention 70 million additional kilograms of CO2 are emitted into the atmosphere annually. U.S. airlines spend up to $500 million on turbulence-related injuries, delays and damages annually, according to the National Center for Atmospheric Research.
Hurricane Helene afflicted much of the Southeast, including North Carolina, Georgia, and Northeast Florida, in late September. It was no doubt a large factor in the nearly 1,000 flights (plus delayed and canceled cruises) in the U.S. per Flight Aware data as of Sept. 27.
Just days later, Western Florida saw another storm — Hurricane Milton. It hit south of Tampa Bay, and damage reached as far as
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