A Number of Hurt as Rough Air Impacts Delta Plane into Sydney, Australia

A number of individuals have been injured when a Delta jet traveling from LA to Sydney, Australia was hit by rough air on Friday morning.

Flight DL41 "encountered brief turbulence" as it touched down at Sydney Airport, an airline spokesperson told. Several cabin crew members were injured.

The New South Wales Ambulance Service said they assessed five patients, and took three of them to the hospital with minor injuries that such as pain in the back and head pain. The injured spanned from their thirties and seventies.

The event represents the most recent case of planes experiencing turbulence, with experts pointing out that global warming is a major factor.

There were 245 people and a crew of 15 on the aircraft, the Delta spokesperson added, clarifying that the plane arrived "safely" at Sydney Airport at 06:48 local time on Friday.

The NSW Ambulance Service reported they received a call just only 180 seconds prior to the plane arrived, and emergency vehicles were ready and waiting at the airport.

Why plane turbulence is getting increasingly prevalent - and often stronger.

Last year, 25 people were injured when a Delta Airlines flight, on a route from Salt Lake City to Amsterdam, Netherlands, hit "considerable" atmospheric disturbance just a couple of hours into the long-haul flight, and diverted for an unscheduled landing.

Earlier this year, passengers and crew on a certain international flight experienced a terrifying short but intense bout of severe turbulence. One passenger passed away and many were hurt, as those without seatbelts rose out of their seats and fell back down.

In-flight turbulence is not uncommon during flights, and while occurrences of rough conditions seem to be rising, they are statistically infrequent.

Research indicates that there are around thousands of instances of severe or worse turbulence annually, out of a overall number of over 35 million journeys that currently occur worldwide.

Intense turbulence is defined as when the sudden jolts of a plane experiencing rough air masses generate greater than a significant G-force on your body - sufficient force to lift you out of your seat if you were not fastened by a safety belt.

As a changing climate shifts the conditions in the sky, specialists caution that flying could become bumpier: warming trends and altered air currents in the jet stream level are likely to heighten the frequency and intensity of significant turbulence.