# When is it appropriate to be scared of turbulence on a commercial flight? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 6, 2013, 12:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-it-appropriate-to-be-scared-of-turbulence-on-a-commercial-flight/675664 "2013-12-06T12:36:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2013, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-it-appropriate-to-be-scared-of-turbulence-on-a-commercial-flight/675664/101 "2013-12-10T20:12:04Z")
> [@bob\_2](#): > > A little while later we took off through black clouds up and down like a roller coaster with lightning flashing all around. Several people were sick and quite a few were praying. We had something similar a few years back. We were flying AA from DFW to Hartsfield, and the first 3/4 of the flight was smooth and calm, but there were thunderstorms over eastern Alabama and most of Georgia, especially around Atlanta. Our pilot just sort of powered through it all on our descent- we were slightly nose-down, shaking like crazy, and what started terrifying me was the corkscrew action, and the occasional sideways slams- as in everything goes 8" to one side or the other, slamming you against the seat (or window) with a weird “thump” sound and we had a couple of up/down ones as well. That’s the only time I’ve white-knuckled it like that; most of the others I consoled myself thinking "We’re not losing altitude as far as I can tell- we’re in straight and more or less level flight, so we’re fine, even if it’s bumpy. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-it-appropriate-to-be-scared-of-turbulence-on-a-commercial-flight/675664/102 "2013-12-11T02:38:06Z")
> [@GusNSpot](#): > > One day on preflight, I found the vertical fin on our C-310Q was broken/buckled about midway up on it’s main spar. It looked fine but when I reached up and gave it a wiggle, ( very good part of a pipeline patrol plane preflight, where I learned the importance of this. ) it actually flopped about 10º from the vertical. “WTF” :eek: was my reaction. I was thinking about why I did not notice it during the last flight. > > Oh, that days flight was scrubbed … 😛 Wow. I preflight the tail looking at the hinges. Never really tugged on the vertical stabilizer. I do giver the horizontal parts a good tug. I Once found the rotating beacon hanging from the top of the tail on a preflight. The mounting screws just fell out and the last landing popped the light off. The last annual I crawled back into the tail to give it a good look over and found a cable wheel frozen. The cable was cutting into it. Luckily it was just the trim indicator. I would have thought I’d feel it binding but that was not the case. > [@GusNSpot](#): > > There were a few flights over the years that I would have expected that result but none recently before I made that discovery. The rudder never felt odd in anyway. Being lucky is sometimes the only explanation for why I lived. > Several times over the years I have found myself, only partly through my own fault, but never the less, outside the box in a way that no designer of that aircraft had ever dreamed possible. > > The idea that since, “We can’t think of it so it will never happen.” is not the best way to go at it. Especially not taking into consideration what smart fools we are sometimes. yah, my return flight from OSH became one of those flights. I lost the GPS over Lake Michigan and the weather stopped cooperating. by the time I got to shore it ceased being VFR and T-storms were building around me. Couldn’t make out the runway lights at 1000 feet AGL because of rain so I flew a 45 degree pattern that crossed both sets of runways. The only thing I could see were the approach lights and by that time I couldn’t make pattern turns without flying into a cell so I cut the engine and dove for lights in a forward slip. Found the numbers and just rode down the runway sideways in a pouring rain at night until I could bleed off enough speed to land. Maybe I should have wandered back out over the lake but I really didn’t want to go airport surfing at that point. > [@GusNSpot](#): > > [rant] > He does not because management & the Airline Pilots Union, which does what all unions do besides the good stuff. > They force bad people to be allowed to continue in critical positions with no regard to public safety. > > Why was that guy in the front of an airliner? He had been told to not do that, right? He refused to follow procedure. Ergo, he should have been gone.[/rant] This. I can think of a number of events that never made the news that were as mind boggling as the Asiana flight into SFO. Why would a union back mistakes of such magnitude? I think the Asiana crew should be charged with manslaughter. That’s how badly they screwed up that landing (barring any unknown factors yet to be revealed). What’s really strange is I see aborted approaches all the time that look very stable only to be followed by the next approach that truly looked bad. I’m on the ground and I see the top of the opposing wing AT 150 ft and THIS is the approach that looks good to the PIC? There’s a conflict of interest when airlines specify limited pitch changes for go-arounds but then crap on the pilots for doing a go-around. It’s a catch-22 mentality. They want pilots to be really conservative on landings but deplore go-arounds. ---
**Author:** ![usedtobe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ec9cab/32.png) [@usedtobe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/usedtobe)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 4:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-it-appropriate-to-be-scared-of-turbulence-on-a-commercial-flight/675664/103 "2013-12-11T04:29:53Z")
If you see hail bouncing off the wing, you can worry - not because of the turbulence, but because your pilot was a damned fool and flew into a thunderstorm - the nastiest weather you can actually survive… I’ll let someone else look up the FAA specs, but I believe airliners carrying passengers are required to be stressed +4/-2G - unless you are an aerobat or a fighter pilot, you have never come close to feeling +1. As noted, takeoff is the biggie - once you hear the wheels come up, relax - the pilot has decided it isn’t going to fall down this time. And anything which can slap a plane down is n ot likely to give advance warning - the microburst comes from nowhere and is gone in a second. Your basic boogeyman for the worrisome passenger. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 4:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-it-appropriate-to-be-scared-of-turbulence-on-a-commercial-flight/675664/104 "2013-12-11T04:51:02Z")
> [@usedtobe](#): > > If you see hail bouncing off the wing, you can worry - not because of the turbulence, but because your pilot was a damned fool and flew into a thunderstorm - the nastiest weather you can actually survive… > > I’ll let someone else look up the FAA specs, but I believe airliners carrying passengers are required to be stressed +4/-2G - unless you are an aerobat or a fighter pilot, you have never come close to feeling +1. > > As noted, takeoff is the biggie - once you hear the wheels come up, relax - the pilot has decided it isn’t going to fall down this time. > > And anything which can slap a plane down is n ot likely to give advance warning - the microburst comes from nowhere and is gone in a second. Your basic boogeyman for the worrisome passenger. 🙂 I think this comes closest to answering what I had in mind – thanks! As for several posters’ suggestion to watch the flight crew – actually I know quite a few flight attendants, and on average I don’t think they have much more than the same layman’s knowledge I do. Obviously they’ve been on board a lot, and so have a sense of what’s unusual for their own flights, but I don’t think they have the technical knowledge of what might be dangerous. (For example, I was once flying out somewhere with a stewardess friend on vacation, and she was very tense on takeoff because the plane was rattling in a way she’d never heard before while on duty – it turns out that her company’s planes are all Boeings, and this plane was an Airbus. Apparently Airbuses make weird noises.) ---
**Author:** ![Xema](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/9de053/32.png) [@Xema](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Xema)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2013, 4:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-it-appropriate-to-be-scared-of-turbulence-on-a-commercial-flight/675664/105 "2013-12-11T04:54:24Z")
> [@usedtobe](#): > > unless you are an aerobat or a fighter pilot, you have never come close to feeling +1 Er, that’s what you feel when you’re sitting at your computer, composing a post to SDMB. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-it-appropriate-to-be-scared-of-turbulence-on-a-commercial-flight/675664.md?page=5)