Civil aircraft airworthiness data recording programme some characteristics of severe turbulence

Abstract

The characteristics of severe turbulence suggested by an initial study of continuous trace records have been tested by examining turbulence encountered over a larger number of flying hours. Records from 23034 flying hours have been searched for patches of severe turbulence and those which produced the highest acceleration increments on the aircraft are presented in detail. It is found that the largest acceleration increment in a patch is on average 1.3 times the value that would be predicted from a Rayleigh distribution of peaks. About a half of the patches occurred without warning, and examination of outside air temperature data suggests that little additional warning would be provided by a conventional ram air temperature measuring device.