CNN: QUEST MEANS BUSINESS Aired April 9, 2013 - 14:00 ET RICHARD QUEST, HOST: A new threat. North Korea is warning foreigners in the South, get out before it's too late. Take back my knighthood. The former boss of HBOS wants his title revoked and has asked for it himself. And buckle up. Trans-Atlantic flights are to get more turbulent. I'm Richard Quest, we have an hour together and, of course, I mean business. --- QUEST: Transatlantic travelers of the world, I beseech you. Brace yourself for a lot more of these. These are return to your seat and secure your seat belt. Coming on the next years ahead, the chance of hitting turbulence on flights between London and New York are more likely to be just Europe and the United States is set to rise. The degree of turbulence is on the rise. According to a study which blames climate change and warns that if CO2 emissions double by the next -- the middle of the next century or this century then, one, the risk of transatlantic clear air turbulence could rise between 40 and 170 percent. Now we're talking about levels of moderate or greater turbulence, the sort of turbulence that would do more than just shake your drink but would probably have you back in your seat and the flight attendants also taking their seats. The amount of airspace with notable amounts of turbulence could double and the effects are clear. There could be a rougher ride onboard the plane, longer journey times and more rerouted flights. I'll explain more about how that's going to work in a moment. Firstly, the actual -- the actual theory of what's going to happen and why. Manoj Joshi from the University of East Anglia worked on the study and I asked him what he discovered. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) MANOJ JOSHI, CLIMATE DYNAMICS EXPERT, UNIVERSITY OF EAST ANGLIA: So what we did was we looked at simulations of the North Atlantic storm track. So we're talking about the jet stream of the North Atlantic in winter. It's the only season and region that we've looked at. And when we look at simulations of this in a climate model looking at conditions when (inaudible) is doubled, the jet stream strengthens and this means that measures of clear air turbulence that are used by airlines and aviation authorities will increase up to 40-170 percent, 170 percent was the large end. QUEST: So because of climate change and global warming more carbon dioxide going into the air and therefore the jet stream getting more powerful, that's the gist of it. JOSHI: (Inaudible). QUEST: What's your time scale for this? Because when we talk global warming, it's always a 1 degree over this number of 20-30 years. What's your time scale? JOSHI: The time scale over we looked at doubling carbon dioxide would probably happen around mid-century time. But of course, that depends on how much carbon we'd continue to emit into the atmosphere. QUEST: Is this a gradual change? So over the next five or 10 years, you would expect as more carbon dioxide goes into the air, turbulence to increase? JOSHI: It's a good question. We would expect it to increase gradually but there could be surprises and we are looking at these sorts of effects in our future work. QUEST: Are planes built to withstand the sorts of turbulence that you are forecasting could happen? JOSHI: We think they are in the sense that more turbulence will happen more often. In terms of extreme turbulence, it's always a bit of a cost-benefit thing, of how you build any sort of engineering. We've got to be very careful about advocating entirely different kinds of planes. At the moment, this is merely a study talking about how turbulence may change in the future. Going to the engineering viewpoint would be something we'd be very careful about. We haven't looked at that yet (inaudible). QUEST: And when the jet stream strengthens and becomes more aggressive, as you described, is it actually getting stronger or is it just getting more disruptive? JOSHI: It's a couple of things. The average winds are predicted to get stronger at those levels, about 10 kilometers up in the atmosphere. But storms themselves, individual storms may become more severe as well as the atmosphere warms up and there's more water vapor in the atmosphere. But it's a good question. Exactly what the distinction is between the two, the average and the storms, we need to look at. QUEST: Right. So the plane could be either facing heavier headwinds or being pushed by stronger tailwinds as well as being buffeted by the storms en route? JOSHI: That's potentially possible. QUEST: And we're talking, what, flight level 31,000 up to 39,000? JOSHI: Something like that. We looked at about 10 kilometers up in the atmosphere, so it's that sort of level, cruise altitude. (END VIDEO CLIP) QUEST: Now to explain a little more about the jet stream, I insist you join me at the departure board. It is just about 20 to 3:00 in the afternoon in the United States. And as at this time of the day, flights are starting to get ready to head back towards Europe from the U.S. coming eastbound across the Atlantic and they do it on various tracks, so-called North Atlantic tracks. And these are the tracks for this evening that are being prepared. They are given a number and basically airlines are told which track they will do and they will follow it right the way across the Atlantic. Think of the tracks as being like raceway tracks that planes fly. And you're given your track -- U, V, W, X, whichever one for your flight. Now these tracks are heavily influenced by the jet stream, which is what we are talking about tonight. And this is tonight's jet stream and how it will influence those flying back across the Atlantic. What this report is basically saying is that as these jet streams and these tracks affect over the years the whole thing will go further north. And as it does so, so passengers and planes will fly further north and that is how you're going to get greater costs involved. That's what's happening tonight. Your plane, of course, is built to withstand this easily, no problem. But Ayesha Durgahee now looks at how turbulence and other extreme weather are factored into aircraft design. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Ladies and gentlemen, we're (inaudible) from the air flight deck. This is your captain. AYESHA DURGAHEE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): An in-flight forecast from the front of the plane. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Weather's a bit cloudy, I'm afraid, a light drizzle and brisk northerly winds. DURGAHEE (voice-over): Once the seat belt sign is on, we can get back to enjoying a meal or a movie, because the planes we fly in are designed to battle the elements that can suddenly cross their paths. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There is one lightning strike every second around the world, every single aircraft is hit by lightning once a year. DURGAHEE (voice-over): Here at Cardiff University in Wales, lightning strikes every day where capacitors discharge a current of 100,000 amps in a microsecond, recreating the power of a lightning bolt at altitude. The aluminum body of an aircraft is highly conductive and acts as a Faraday cage, a metallic shield that directs the electric charge outside towards the back of the plane. And the passengers on board won't feel a thing. This $2 million lightning lab, in partnership with EADS and the World Government, tests different conductor strips from the nose of the plane and new composite materials found on modern aircraft. Another built-in defense mechanism is using the heat from the engines to melt ice around them and along the edge of the wings. As well as freezing temperatures, aircraft can cope when dry, cold air collides with rising warm, moist air, in other words, turbulence. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The aircraft slightly rolls and pitches up. DURGAHEE (voice-over): Here at Imperial College London, it's the landing phase, though, that's the most critical. During crosswinds and wind shear. PROF. MICHAEL LEISCHZINER, AERONAUTICS, IMPERIAL COLLEGE LONDON: Turbulence is, again, the process of vortices generated up-and-down movements, and these up-and-down movements cause dropping and rising. And aircraft (inaudible) percent heavier than need be. It is, in a sense, overdimensioned. The routes (ph) of the wing are very thick in order to withstand extreme conditions of turbulence. When you fly the aircraft, which seems to be out of control, the aircraft structure is sufficiently strong to withstand any of this. DURGAHEE (voice-over): When it comes to aircraft design and weather, at research level, there are men and women dedicating their lives to specific weather conditions to ensure planes are built to buffer and bear the harshest of conditions. And then it's up to the pilots to do the rest -- Ayesha Durgahee, CNN, London. (END VIDEO CLIP) QUEST: So that's what it's all about, the turbulence that the plane is safe. Jenny Harrison is with us at the World Weather Center. Jenny, I was showing the tracks over the Atlantic tonight that planes will be flying. But you're the one qualified to tell us whether or not it will be smooth. JENNY HARRISON, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Well, I can tell you about the U.S., Richard. That much I can because, in actual fact, we've got some really severe thunderstorms erupting over the next couple of days. A line of weather is going to work its way across the west towards the southeast. It is that time of year we've got this bitterly cold air across the north and west, mild, very mild and very moist across the southeast. And it's typical at this time of year, there's two air masses. Of course they clash together and we see these severe storms erupting. Look at this, -9 right now in Denver and then across the southeast we've got 24 in Dallas, 25 in Atlanta and it's along this dividing line that we see these severe thunderstorms erupting. And you can see this is what's going to happen. So as the storm systems work their way east, this is always going to be the danger area. So there is actually a forecast that is put out every single day and it actually does show where the turbulence is likely to be. So all these areas in orange, as you can see, this is actually the forecast for 0400 GMT, obviously for tomorrow, shall we say. And so these areas in orange pretty much in line with that line of thunderstorms as they work their way eastwards. So as I say, that is put out on a regular basis every single day. And obviously it goes -- it's put out for several hours ahead. So as we go through the next couple of days, we expect to see this probably change color but also certainly work its way eastwards in line with that particular line of thunderstorms. Now these storms, of course, the planes cannot fly over them. This is the actual next 48 hours. You can see that line there. We expect to see tornadoes, of course, within these thunderstorms, certainly very large damaging hail, strong winds and, as I say, this is Tuesday into Wednesday. So expect some severe delays there. Wednesday high-temperatures at best -2 in Denver. Meanwhile 27 degrees Celsius will be the high Wednesday in Atlanta. I will drop down as that storm system comes through. Talking of temperatures dropping down, still not feeling too great across central and northern areas of Europe. But the change already began. You can see the last 12 hours, mostly rain coming through across much of France, still some sleet mixed in. The U.K. mostly rain, again, a little few patches of sleet. These are the temperatures right now with the wind factored in, -4 in Copenhagen, 0 in Berlin. But look at this, 11 Celsius in Paris. These are the high temperatures this Tuesday. So finally Paris actually at average (inaudible) the length of time, of course, in Paris with temperatures below average hasn't been that long, 10 Celsius in London. So beginning to get a little bit closer. But believe it or not, it has been 33 days in London with those temperatures consecutively below the average. This is going to be the pattern for the next few days. It will slowly warm up. But it does mean we're back to rather wet and windies across much of the northwest and west of Europe, Richard. QUEST: Jenny Harrison at the World Weather Center.