WASHINGTON A flight from Lufthansa through severe turbulence and was diverted Washington Dulles International Airportus US. Seven people had to be taken to area hospitals, officials said. According to a passenger The pilot reported that the plane fell 1,000 feet (about 305 meters) during the sudden turbulence.
Flight 469 out austinin Texas Frankfurtat Germany, but landed safely at Virginia Airport Wednesday night, said Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority spokesman Michael Cabbage. Crews rescued passengers and took seven people to hospitals with minor injuries, Cabbage said.
The Airbus A330 reported severe turbulence while flying at an altitude of 37,000 feet (about 11,300 meters). Tennessee, the Federal Aviation Administration said in a statement. The agency is investigating.
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According to passenger Susan Zimmerman, 34, of Austin, one of the pilots told the cockpit that the plane fell about 1,000 feet during the sudden turbulence. “I felt like the ground went off my feet,” she said in a phone interview. “Everything was floating. For a moment I was weightless.”
The turbulence happened midway through meal service as passengers and crew moved around the cabin, said Zimmerman, who is five months pregnant. She said she was still buckled up and that neither she nor the baby were hurt. “I’m sure she overslept it,” he said. “She’s surrounded by amniotic fluid.”
the Brazilian model Camila Alvethe wife of the American actor Matthew McConaughey was on the flight and reported the incident. “The plane was in CHAOS and the turbulence kept coming,” he wrote.
The brief but severe turbulence occurred about 90 minutes after takeoff and led to the unscheduled precautionary landing, Lufthansa said in a statement. Passengers were given medical attention and Lufthansa ground staff were working to relocate the passengers, the airline said. There were 172 passengers on board.
“The safety and wellbeing of passengers and crew is Lufthansa’s top priority at all times,” the statement said.
Turbulence remains a leading cause of inflight accidents and injuries, according to a 2021 report by the National Transportation Safety Board. Between 2009 and 2018, turbulence accounted for 37.6% of all accidents on major commercial airlines.
Turbulence is essentially unstable air that moves unpredictably. Most people associate it with violent thunderstorms. But the most dangerous type is clear air turbulence, which can be difficult to predict and often gives no visible warning in the sky ahead.
Thunderstorms swept across areas of Tennessee late Wednesday, creating strong winds in the upper atmosphere, said Scott Unger, a senior weather forecaster with the National Weather Service in Nashville. “There was a lot of wind in the air, which could easily create turbulence on any flight,” he said./AP