The turbulence occurred with no warning.
At least 35 passengers were wounded when an Air Canada flight on its way to Sydney encountered severe turbulence on Thursday.
Flight AC33, carrying 269 passengers and 15 crew, was flying from Vancouver to Sydney when the Boeing 777 aircraft “encountered unforecasted and sudden turbulence approximately two hours past Hawaii,” the airline said.
The plane was diverted to Honolulu and landed safely.
Thirty people were taken to hospital in Honolulu on Thursday. Nine had severe injuries, officials say.
“Our first priority is always the safety of our flights, passengers and crew and as a precaution, medical personnel are on standby to examine passengers in Honolulu,” the airline said in a statement.
“We hit turbulence and we all hit the roof, and everything fell down… people went flying,” Jess Smith, a passenger on board the flight, told local TV station KHON.
“Some people that weren’t strapped in, you saw them rise in the air and hit their heads on the roof and everything, so it was quite intense,” another passenger told the station.
Alex Macdonald, a passenger from Australia on board the plane, told CBC News the passengers were “extremely shocked”.
“I saw the people ahead of me hitting the overhead baggage compartments and then just slamming back into their seats,” she said.
The episode of turbulence happened at 36,000 feet, about 600 miles southwest of Honolulu.
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