Fasten your seatbelts.
If turbulence gives you the jitters, maybe fly around the Rocky Mountains — the high-elevation region was home to some of the most unsettled air in the US last year, according to a new report.
With terrifying videos showcasing just how unfriendly the skies can be now regularly cropping up on social media and in the news, the anxiety-making analysis reveals which routes are the most likely to have you clutching your seat and saying your prayers — should you want to make alternate plans.
The five worst offenders in the country were all within the Mountain Time Zone.
Those hoping for a smooth journey should not be flying Albuquerque to Denver, for starters — the city pair ranked as the worst in the fifty states for jumpy jetsetters, according to the data crunchers at Turbli, a turbulence forecast tool.
Turbulence is “air movement that normally cannot be seen and often occurs unexpectedly. It can be created by many different conditions, including atmospheric pressure, jet streams, air around mountains, cold or warm weather fronts or thunderstorms,” according to the FAA.
To build its annual list, Turbli monitors turbulence forecast data from NOAA and the UK Met Office, it said, also randomly sampling nearly 1.5 million flight tracks per year to evaluate for disturbances.
At the end of each year, everything is added up and averaged out to determine the less-than-prestigious rankings.
Denver wound up somewhat overrepresented at the top of the list — the flutter-inducing flight from the Mile High City to the elite resort town of Jackson, Wyo. ranked at number two, while the hop from Jackson to Salt Lake City came in at number three.
Salt Lake back to Denver took number four, and the mountain town of Bozeman, Mont. rounded out the top five for it’s trip back to — you guessed it — Denver.
Every single flight in the top 10 was within the region, or immediately adjacent, with one exception — Ontario, Calif. to San Diego, a short hop within Southern California that also passes over some relatively mountainous terrain.
No flights east of the Rockies made the uncoveted grade.
The most turbulent flight routes in the US for 2024
- Albuquerque (ABQ) – Denver (DEN)
- Denver (DEN) – Jackson (JAC)
- Jackson (JAC) – Salt Lake City (SLC)
- Denver (DEN) – Salt Lake City (SLC)
- Bozeman (BZN) – Denver (DEN)
- Ontario (ONT) – San Diego (SAN)
- Boise (BOI) – Salt Lake City (SLC)
- Bozeman (BZN) – Salt Lake City (SLC)
- Las Vegas (LAS) – Reno (RNO)
- Las Vegas (LAS) – Salt Lake City (SLC)
The data dump also included analysis of overseas flights, with flights over mountain ranges once again taking the top rankings.
The most notorious involves a trip over the Andes — Mendoza, Argentina to Santiago, Chile, a journey one travel writer referred to as “quick and brutal.”
“This was the kind of flight were the seat belt sign stays on for the entire time and no one walks around, including flight attendants (I kissed my cup of coffee goodbye…),” said a blogger at Correr es mi Destino.
Another route over the Andes, from Santiago to Cordoba, Argentina, ranked in second place.
Either Mendoza or Santiago were at one end of six out of the top 10 most fearsome flights.
