Southwest Airlines is making a change to its flights. Here's what to know

Southwest Airlines (LUV-2.76%) is making another change in a year when so many have already come. USA Today reports that the carrier recently made a policy shift that will end cabin service and prepare passengers for landing earlier in flights.

In a statement provided to Quartz, the company said the procedure, in which food-and-beverage offerings will stop 10 minutes earlier starting Wednesday, was being rolled out in the name of safety.

“Southwest Airlines Flight Attendants will begin preparing the cabin for landing at an altitude of 18,000 feet beginning Dec. 4,” the company said. “The change in procedures is designed to reduce the risk of in-flight turbulence injuries for our Crew Members and Customers. It is the result of the airline’s close collaboration with its Labor partners and a robust approach to Safety Management. Previously, preparation for landing began at 10,000 feet. Nothing is more important to Southwest Airlines than the Safety of our Customers and Employees.”

Neither Southwest Airlines nor the union representing its flight attendants, Local 513 of the Transport Workers Union, responded to a Quartz request for comment.

In April, the Federal Aviation Administration announced it would investigate a pair of in-flight incidents at Southwest, one of which involved severe turbulence so bad that a plane headed to Orlando, Florida from New Orleans had to make an emergency landing in Tampa.

In the most severe incidence of turbulence this year, a passenger died from injuries sustained during a Singapore Airlines flight going from London to Singapore. A 2017 paper suggests climate change will increase how much turbulence that flyers experience will increase due to greater amounts of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere caused by human greenhouse gas emissions.

Southwest Airlines has already seen plenty of change this year — it’s reconsidering everything from its open-seat boarding process to its corporate board amid business struggles and a since-settled activist shareholder push by the hedge fund Elliott Investment Management.