SINGAPORE
\nSingapore Airlines said 74 passengers and six crew members are still in Bangkok, including those receiving medical care and their family members, after a flight encountered severe turbulence on Tuesday.
\nThe airline said in a statement that an additional five passengers who were on board the SQ321 flight will return to Singapore on Wednesday, and one crew member is set to return on Thursday.
\nThe scheduled London-Singapore flight was diverted to Bangkok after the plane was buffeted by turbulence that flung passengers and crew around the cabin, slamming some into the ceiling. A 73-year-old British passenger died of a suspected heart attack.
\n\u201cI saw people from across the aisle going completely horizontal, hitting the ceiling and landing back down in like really awkward positions. People, like, getting massive gashes in the head, concussions,\u201d Dzafran Azmir, a 28-year-old student on board the flight said after arriving in Singapore.
\nPhotographs from the interior of the plane showed gashes in the overhead cabin panels, oxygen masks and panels hanging from the ceiling and luggage strewn around. A passenger said some people\u2019s heads had slammed into the lights above the seats and punctured the panels.
\nSingapore Airlines took 131 passengers and 12 crew on the relief flight from Bangkok that reached Singapore just before 5 a.m. (2100 GMT). There were 211 passengers including many Australians, British and Singaporeans, and 18 crew on board the original flight; injured fliers and their families remained in Bangkok.
\n\u201cOn behalf of Singapore Airlines, I would like to express my deepest condolences to the family and loved ones of the deceased,\u201d Singapore Airlines CEO Goh Choon Phong said in a video message.
\nSingapore\u2019s Transport Safety Investigation Bureau (TSIB) is looking into the incident, and the US National Transportation Safety Board is also sending representatives for support.
\nThe plane encountered sudden extreme turbulence, Goh said, and the pilot then declared a medical emergency and diverted to Bangkok.
\nAircraft tracking provider FlightRadar 24 said at around 0749 GMT the flight encountered \u201ca rapid change in vertical rate, consistent with a sudden turbulence event,\u201d based on flight tracking data.
\n\u201cThere were thunderstorms, some severe, in the area at the time,\u201d it said.
\nThe sudden turbulence occurred over the Irrawaddy Basin in Myanmar about 10 hours into the flight, the airline said. Turbulence has many causes, most obviously the unstable weather patterns that trigger storms, but this flight could have been affected by clear air turbulence, which is very difficult to detect.
\nTurbulence-related airline accidents are the most common type of accident, according to a 2021 NTSB study.
\nWhile the airline said 30 people were injured, Samitivej Hospital in Thailand said it was treating 71 passengers.
\nFrom 2009 through 2018, the US agency found that turbulence accounted for more than a third of reported airline accidents and most resulted in one or more serious injuries, but no aircraft damage.
\nSingapore Airlines, which is widely recognized as one of the world\u2019s leading airlines and is a benchmark for much of the industry, has not had any major incidents in recent years.
\nIts last accident resulting in casualties was a flight from Singapore to Los Angeles via Taipei, where it crashed on Oct. 31, 2000 at the Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport, killing 83 of the 179 people on board.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
SINGAPORE Singapore Airlines said 74 passengers and six crew members are still in Bangkok, including those receiving medical care and their family members, after a flight encountered severe turbulence on Tuesday. The airline said in a statement that an additional five passengers who were on board the SQ321 flight will return to Singapore on Wednesday, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":408762,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-408747","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n