The TERRIFYING Physics Behind Airplane Turbulence Your blog post

I Almost DIED on a Plane and Now I'm Obsessed with Turbulence Physics!

So, I was flying to India in December to see my grandparents and our plane hit the worst turbulence ever. Like people were literally screaming and this lady was praying out loud while I was frantically texting my friends thinking these were gonna be my last.

But here's what's weird about me - while everyone was losing their minds, part of my brain was like "okay but what's actually happening here scientifically??" So obviously when I got home, I went down this massive research rabbit hole because apparently almost dying makes me want to understand Why???

What Even Is This Nightmare??

Turbulence is basically when air gets all chaotic instead of flowing smoothly. Like when you're in a calm swimming pool versus when your annoying cousin cannonballs in and everything goes crazy - same concept but 35,000 feet up which is terrifying.

We hit "severe clear air turbulence" and I swear my stomach literally hit the roof! The worst part is you can't see it!

Why Does This Happen Though??

While death-gripping my parents' hands, my brain kept trying to figure out the science. Different air temperatures create unstable spots, plus high and low pressure areas trying to balance out creates wind shears. Mountains create invisible air "waves" too! And other planes leave spinning trails that can mess you up!

My Actual Near-Death Experience

During the worst drops my phone literally FLOATED in front of my face before gravity remembered to work! Everything not strapped down went flying because Newton's laws don't care that we're terrified!

The captain's doing calm announcements like "experiencing some turbulence" and I'm like THIS IS THE APOCALYPSE!!

What I Learned

Apparently, planes are basically indestructible, and turbulence feels way scarier than it actually is. My physics teacher says no commercial plane has ever crashed just from turbulence.

But I'm still taking trains for a while! Anyone else experienced the floating phone thing??