Eye Damage From Staring At Powerful LED Flashlight (420 lumens) for 15 seconds?

[johndoejohndoes]

I was at my grandmothers house today and she's almost blind. She can only see stuff when she shines a powerful LED flashlight on the object she's looking at.

I was at her house with my kid and before I knew it she was shining the light directly in my face and my daughters face from about 2 feet away. I tried being polite and I was looking at the light trying to have a conversation for about 15 seconds before I had to tell her to turn it off.

It probably took about 30-45 minutes before the light that was burned into my vision finally went away. Is it possible this type of LED flashlight could cause any serious/permanent eye damage for me or my daughter?

She has two lights, both LEDLENSER, but I'm not sure if she was using the P5R or P5R.2. Here are both pictures 1 and 2) of both flashlights.

I've attached two pictures above and I'm unclear if their maximum lumen output is 270 lumens or 420 lumens.

Let's just go with the worst case scenario that we were looking directly at a 420 lumen LED flashlight for 15 seconds...can something like that cause any serious/permanent eye damage?

 

[richbuff]

I have enough eye damage from playing with several thousand lumen lights, that I can't see commercial links anymore. I asked my doctor, he referred me to an optometrist, and he told me that if I keep it up, I will need a commercial link seeing eye dog.


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I guess I am not missing much.

 

[archimedes]

I had tried to explain to the OP the reason for removing sales links from "first posts" but the forum was only intermittently responsive at that time.

Nevertheless, I will quote Alaric from another similar thread asking about eye damage ...

The best place to receive medical advice is a medical professional.

I'd err on the side of safety and see an optometrist or ophthalmologist.

Thanks for checking.

 

[thermal guy]

420 lumens for 15 seconds? I'm not sure you can even do that. That's why we have eye lids and safety systems put into our bodies. You would close your eyes immediately I would think. But what do I know. I have burnt my eyes with a plasma gun so many times I can't count.

 

[PhotonWrangler]

Not all of that light is going to be collected by the lens and focused on the retina. Having said that, only an opthomologist can tell for sure after running appropriate tests.