Singapore Airlines SQ321 turbulence: rapid gravitational force changes likely led to injuries, investigators say

Aviation experts told This Week In Asia that the preliminary findings did not reveal anything surprising and were par for the course in such aviation investigations.

Following the incident, Singapore Airlines announced last week that it would suspend meal services and have crew members return to their seats and put on their seat belts during an activation of the seat belt sign, in a move to take on “a more cautious approach to managing turbulence in-flight”.

The crew would also continue to advise passengers to return to their seats and secure their seat belts, and monitor customers who may require help, including those in the lavatories, a Singapore Airlines spokeswoman said.

Hong Kong’s Greater Bay Airlines also announced on Wednesday that it would encourage passengers to fasten their seat belts at all times, with reminders from cabin crew and announcements on board.

Singapore’s transport ministry on Wednesday said the Transport Safety Investigation Bureau of Singapore had extracted the data stored in the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder of flight SQ321.

A team of investigators – from Singapore’s bureau and United States representatives from the National Transportation Safety Board, the Federal Aviation Administration and planemaker Boeing – have compiled a chronology of events based on their preliminary analysis.

They found that the flight was normal before the turbulence event. But when the plane passed over the south of Myanmar, it likely flew over an area of “developing convective activity” at 37,000 feet. Convective activity or convection in this instance refers to the process by which heat travels through air.

At 07.49am Coordinate Universal Time or UTC (11.49pm Hong Kong time, May 20) the gravitational