Bangkok, May 29 (EFE).- An altitude drop of 54 meters in 4 seconds caused injuries to more than 100 passengers and crew who were not wearing seat belts during Singapore Airlines flight SQ321, a preliminary report said Wednesday.

The plane, a Boeing 777-300ER that was 10 hours into its London to Singapore route on May 21, was flying over southern Myanmar when it hit extreme turbulence.

While the pilots, who "called out that the fasten seat belt sign had been switched on," tried to control the speed and altitude of the aircraft, the plane experienced a "rapid change in G" (gravitational force) that "likely resulted in the occupants who were not belted up to become airborne," the Singapore Ministry of Transport report said.

"The rapid changes in G over the 4.6 sec duration resulted in an altitude drop of 178 ft (54 meters), from 37,362 ft to 37,184 ft. This sequence of events likely caused the injuries to the crew and passengers," it added.

Once the cabin crew informed the pilots that there were injuries among the passengers, they made the decision to change course and request an emergency landing at Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi airport.

A 73-year-old Briton died due to a heart attack, while more than 100 people requirement medical attention and/or hospitalization in the Thai capital.

According to the latest report of injured, published on Tuesday by the airline, 28 people are still hospitalized.

The Singapore authorities detailed the chronology of the incident after analyzing the plane's flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder - known together as the black box - in an investigation in which representatives of the US authorities and Boeing participated.

This is the first Singapore Airlines incident with fatalities since the 2000 SQ006 tragedy, in which a Boeing 747 crashed after attempting to take off from the wrong runway in Taiwan during a typhoon, causing 83 fatalities of the 179 on board. EFE

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