Turbulence is a common fear for flyers — especially in the wake of Sunday’s tragic Learjet crash, in which a private aircraft carrier co-piloted by 20-year-old Nathalia Gadelha Filgueiras smashed to the ground in Palm Beach County, Florida, killing all nine people on board.
Though the official cause of the accident has not yet been determined, Filgueiras texted her pilot boyfriend just 10 minutes before the crash saying, “I’ve got turbulence, I’ve got ice,’” according to her stepfather, Thiago Corleti.
The intended route Filgueiras and the other pilot (who has not yet been identified) were taking was from Austin-Bergstrom International Airport in Texas to North Eleuthera Airport in the Bahamas. But there’s another in-air trip in North America that’s known to be the most turbulent of them all.
According to a 2025 study conducted by aviation information company Turbli, the most turbulent route in North America was the 1.7-hour flight between Denver, Colorado and Jackson, Wyoming.
The study, which covered 10,000 routes between 550 of the world’s largest airports, assessed the routes’ eddy dissipation rate (EDR), which measures turbulence’s intensity in the atmosphere, per Explore.com. A higher EDR equates to turbulent energy dissipating more quickly, which in turn leads to stronger turbulence.
In Turbli’s study, these EDR turbulence levels were classified as light (0-20), moderate (20-40), moderate to severe (40-60), severe (60-80) and extreme (80-100).
The journey between Denver and Jackson rung in at an edr of 18.18 — which may seem low to have achieved the highest ranking of the bunch, but Turbli clarified that “the ranking tables might seem to have too low levels, but this is because they are yearly average.”
The world’s most turbulent route was determined to be from Mendoza, Argentina to Santiago Chile, with an EDR of nearly 23.
Both routes that topped their respective categories share that they fly over mountain ranges — a flight from Denver to Jackson crosses the U.S. Rocky Mountain regions (as did the other “top 10” US contenders), while the international route from Mendoza to Santiago crosses the Andes Mountains.
Defined by the National Weather Service as “an irregular motion of the air resulting from eddies and vertical currents,” turbulence is an unpleasant but common occurrence on most flights.
The scary truth is that these shake-ups — which can range from light jostling with slight changes in altitude to extreme, violent tossing where the aircraft is impossible to control — are on the rise.
When speaking on the issue in a previous Post story, Dr. Paul Williams, a professor of atmospheric science and head of the department of meteorology at the University of Reading, said that there are environmental reasons for the in-air trouble.
“We’re outputting more energy…we’re stirring up the atmosphere,” said Williams. “No part of the planet is immune.”
The professor also referenced a report in one of the world’s leading geophysical journals, which found there’s 55% more turbulence over the North Atlantic today than in the 1970s and 44% more above America.
While aviation pros are looking into fixes to the issue — such as a system of computerized “flaplets” that can be added to an airplane’s wings, created by startup Turbulence Solutions — for now, it’s still a problem.
“That’s pretty catastrophic,” Williams said of the data.
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