Multiple Affected as In-Flight Disturbance Hits A Delta Airlines Plane into Sydney, Australia

Several people were hurt following a Delta Airlines jet traveling from LA to Sydney, Australia encountered rough air on Friday morning.

The flight, numbered 41 "went through a short bout of rough air" as it landed at Sydney Airport, an airline spokesperson told. Four flight attendants were injured.

The New South Wales Ambulance Service stated they evaluated five patients, and transferred three to a medical facility with minor injuries that included back pain and head pain. The patients' ages ranged from their 30s up to the 70s.

It is the most recent case of commercial jets encountering atmospheric disturbance, with researchers saying that climate change is a major factor.

On board were nearly 250 travelers and fifteen staff members on the wide-body jet, the representative noted, adding that the plane landed "safely" at Sydney Airport at 06:48 local time on the day in question.

The NSW Ambulance Service indicated they were alerted just a mere three minutes prior to the plane landed, and emergency vehicles were waiting on the tarmac.

Why in-flight bumpiness is getting more common - and potentially more dangerous.

In the previous year, two dozen individuals sustained injuries when a separate Delta aircraft, travelling from Salt Lake City, Utah to Amsterdam, Netherlands, experienced "severe" rough air just two hours into the long-haul flight, and had to make an unscheduled landing.

Earlier this year, travelers and staff on a Singapore Airlines flight went through a harrowing five seconds bout of severe turbulence. A traveler passed away and numerous people sustained injuries, as individuals not fastened in were thrown from their seats and fell back down.

In-flight turbulence is not uncommon on aircraft journeys, and while occurrences of strong or severe turbulence appear to be increasing, they are still very rare.

Estimates show that there are an estimated thousands of instances of significant in-flight disturbance each year, out of a overall number of more than 35 million journeys that currently occur around the world.

Intense turbulence is categorized as when the up and down movements of a plane going through rough air masses generate greater than 1.5 times the force of gravity on your body - enough to lift you out of your seat if you weren't wearing a seatbelt.

As global warming shifts the conditions in the sky, specialists caution that flying could become bumpier: temperature changes and changing jet streams in the higher altitudes are projected to boost the frequency and intensity of dangerous in-flight bumps.