Why your next flight could face more turbulence than before
Experts say the future of flight safety will depend on combining real-time aircraft data, artificial intelligence and more advanced atmospheric forecasting
24 August, 2026
TT
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The recent Air India flight from Phuket to Delhi that experienced a sudden altitude loss, leaving passengers and crew injured, has once again thrust turbulence into the spotlight. While investigators continue examining the precise cause of the incident, aviation experts say the event highlights a much broader challenge confronting airlines worldwide: predicting clear-air turbulence before aircraft encounter it.
Unlike thunderstorms, clear-air turbulence cannot be seen by pilots or detected by conventional weather radar, making it one of the industry’s most persistent operational challenges.
“Clear-air turbulence is hard to predict because, unlike a thunderstorm, it doesn’t appear in standard meteorological models and, in real time, doesn’t show up on radar,” says Maya Shpak, CEO of SkyPath, whose turbulence intelligence platform is used on more than 40,000 flights daily by airlines including Emirates, American Airlines, United Airlines and Japan Airlines.
“These legacy models are excellent at detecting convective activity, the visible, moisture-driven weather that shows up on a screen, but clear-air turbulence leaves no visible signature and gives no visual warning. It’s invisible until you’re already in it, which is why the industry has struggled with it for more than 30 years.”
She says even accurate weather forecasts often lack the precision pilots need.
“A regional forecast can be completely accurate and still tell a crew almost nothing they can act on. It might say rough air exists somewhere along a 300-mile corridor, but not whether it’s at 35,000 feet or 37,000, or whether it starts in 20 minutes or two hours.”
“The decisions that actually prevent injuries — which altitude, which heading, when to secure the cabin — happen in feet and minutes, not across a stretch of sky that size.”
Aircraft become the sensors
Instead of relying solely on weather models, airlines are increasingly using aircraft already in the sky as real-time turbulence sensors.
SkyPath’s platform uses a patented algorithm running on pilots’ existing cockpit iPads, combining onboard motion data with ADS-B information, Eddy Dissipation Rate measurements, pilot reports and machine-learning forecasts to create a live turbulence map.
“SkyPath turns every aircraft already in the air into a turbulence sensor,” says Shpak.
“Weather radar detects convective activity, thunderstorms and storm cells, not clear-air turbulence, which produces no radar return at all. SkyPath fills that gap, using the aircraft itself, and thousands of others flying the same skies, as the sensor network.”
The technology reflects a broader shift across aviation.
“A few years ago, turbulence management was mostly reactive… That’s changed. Safety officers and flight operations leaders aren’t asking whether they should do something about turbulence anymore. They’re asking where to find the best, most current data so that they can be proactive in planning and preparing.”
Climate change and El Niño add new complexity
The challenge is becoming more pressing as scientific evidence points to increasing turbulence in many parts of the world.
Professor Paul Williams, head of the Department of Meteorology and professor of Atmospheric Science at the University of Reading, says recent research has identified a connection between El Niño and stronger clear-air turbulence.
“When we analysed 40 years of atmospheric data recently, we found strong evidence to support this idea.”
“During a typical swing from strong La Niña to strong El Niño conditions, we found that the wind shear at flight cruising altitudes over the North Atlantic increases by around 35%, and the amount of clear-turbulence increases by around 30%.”
“These impacts on turbulence are not confined to the North Atlantic, but extend all around the world, including Asia.”
Williams says climate change is reinforcing that trend.
“I have been studying the link between climate change and turbulence for 15 years.”
“We see it in observational data since satellites began observing the atmosphere in 1979, we see it in supercomputer simulations of the future climate, and we understand the basic physical mechanisms involved.”
“For flight routes in the midlatitudes of the Northern Hemisphere, including the Middle East, Asia, the North Pacific, North America, the North Atlantic, and Europe, the projections are for hundreds of per cent more turbulence by the 2060s.”
Beyond safety, a business issue
While passenger safety remains paramount, airlines also face significant operational and financial implications.
Shpak says a five-year study by one airline found a 40-50 per cent reduction in turbulence-related injuries after integrating real-time turbulence intelligence into daily operations.
“Cabin crew accounts for 80% of turbulence-related injuries industry-wide, so that’s a direct safety and liability line item.”
She adds that turbulence-related rerouting, altitude changes and additional fuel burn account for roughly 1-2 per cent of fleet fuel costs, with airlines using the technology recovering an estimated 0.5 to 1 per cent of fleet fuel costs per aircraft each year. Fewer severe encounters also reduce the need for post-flight aircraft inspections.
AI becomes the next safety layer
Both experts believe the next major advance will come from combining atmospheric science with AI and live aircraft observations.
“The biggest breakthrough would be to move from forecasting turbulence indirectly — from large-scale atmospheric conditions — to predicting the turbulence itself,” says Williams.
“Ultimately, I expect the biggest gains to come from combining physics-based forecasting, machine learning, and real-time aircraft observations into a single system that continuously updates the predicted turbulence along each flight route, which is exactly the approach that SkyPath are taking.”
Shpak agrees that turbulence intelligence is becoming as fundamental to aviation as traditional weather forecasting.
“Absolutely. It took decades to develop tools for wind shear and icing, which are now mandatory, and no aircraft flies without them.”
“Turbulence has historically been treated as background risk, but that is no longer the case.”
For airlines operating through the Gulf, where long-haul networks connect Europe, Asia, Africa and the Americas, she argues that real-time turbulence intelligence is rapidly becoming core operational infrastructure rather than an optional safety enhancement.
While the investigation into the Air India incident continues, the episode has reinforced a wider industry message: turbulence may never be eliminated, but the ability to anticipate and avoid it is becoming one of aviation’s fastest-moving areas of innovation.
