Laser injures Delta pilot's eye

[dasfx]

Laser injures Delta pilot\'s eye

Thought folks might find this interesting:

http://washingtontimes.com/national/20040928-111356-3924r.htm

DasFX

 

[Lasernerd]

Re: Laser injures Delta pilot\'s eye

This is not good!
you all best have your C.D.R.H. paperwork inline!
the flash to the eye really does hurt for some time,just the scatter is intense enough to cause pain....
also to say at that range it must have been high power
I would assume maybe 10+ watts..
In Canada we are allowed to crowd scan with 3 watts of laser energy.

 

[gorn]

Re: Laser injures Delta pilot\'s eye

With the quotes from the Military and talk of terrorist weapon use of lasers. I can see a Federal ban on all personal lasers coming.

Some fools just don't know how to use comon sense and will eventually screw it up for all of us. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/mad.gif

 

[Shiftlock]

Re: Laser injures Delta pilot\'s eye

Oh great, now all laser owners are potential terrorists. Yup, I agree, this is just what the U.S. Government needs to heavily regulate lasers of all kinds in the near future. Some people are so stupid. Why point a high power laser at an airplane? I just don't get it. Must be that syndrome that most kids grow out of where they just have to do something if they know they're not supposed to. Dumbasses.

 

[gregw45]

Re: Laser injures Delta pilot\'s eye

This article states it was a "red light that illuminated the cockpit".

http://feeds.bignewsnetwork.com/?sid=868da9a9b1cfbac8

 

[Myx]

Re: Laser injures Delta pilot\'s eye

Hey i'm just glad it didnt happen in the UK...

We'd have had someone getting hit by a 5-foot-diameter beam from a keychain red laser.... and then selling a story to The Sun/News of the World etc about how they were "temporarily blinded" by a "terrorist with a laser"....

Gordan Brown would step in with a typical British kneejerk reaction and announce that blindness is not a laughing matter; then enforce some pathetic change in the law.... I dunno, maybe decreasing the UK legal laser pointer ouput limit YET AGAIN, to 0.5mW or something....


But on a serious note... it must have had quite some power, for a red laser to actually cause eye damage at such a range.

 

[Saaby]

Re: Laser injures Delta pilot\'s eye

[ QUOTE ]
A pilot flying a Delta Air Lines jet was injured by a laser that illuminated the cockpit of the aircraft as it approached Salt Lake City International Airport last week, U.S. officials said.

[/ QUOTE ]

Wasn't me I swear!

 

[James S]

Re: Laser injures Delta pilot\'s eye

How are these cockpits setup on these aircraft? I know that they can see the ground from them, but could you really fire a laser up in to the eyes of the pilot from the ground?

Since the plane was landing when it happened it wasn't at a very high altitude. But still, whats the beam divergence on even a high powered laser like that? Was it really a red laser? I didn't think you could pump up the output from a laser diode that much. And even if you had a big laser, multiple watts, thats multiple watts in a 1mm beam spot. As that grows bigger and bigger over distance the available power that can hit someones eyes reduces along with the diameter of the beam. Anybody care to do the math? I'll stare quite happily into the beam of your 10 watt laser if I can do it after the beam has diverged to several feet in diameter /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif

are there even any really big red lasers? You can pump a lot of power out of a flashlamp pumped ruby laser, but they are somewhat difficult to home brew due mostly to the flashlamp charging circuits and the like. And that doesn't sound like what they were hit with as you wouldn't see it "illuminate" the cockpit like they describe.

I think it will be a while before we find out whats going on.

 

[2dim]

Re: Laser injures Delta pilot\'s eye

The house I grew up in was exactly one mile from the end of a main runway at the international airport outside Montreal. The big jets flew right over, only between 500 and 1000 feet max. I used to listen to the pilots on our FM radio. Cracks developed in the ceilings while everything shook. Telephone conversations had to be paused. Hate to say it, but I might have shot back, given the opportunity...Wasn't until after I got older and flew in the airforce that I realized how dangerous landing an aircraft can be. Bad enough they're forced by law to cut power as they pass over houses to avoid excessive noise, any other distractions or potentially dangerous situations certainly will not be tolerated. Those were the old days, when turboprops were being phased out. We kids used to have BB gun wars and think nothing of it. Nowadays in big city Canada, just carrying a replica handgun will bring the ETF down on someone. My old capgun would have done it for sure! Times have sure changed...

 

[Lasernerd]

Re: Laser injures Delta pilot\'s eye

laugh at this one

http://slashdot.org/articles/04/09/29/1420215.shtml?tid=172&tid=99&tid=1

 

[comozo]

Re: Laser injures Delta pilot\'s eye

When I hear stories like this I read them with a grain of salt. I have yet to hear of any confirmed eye injury. This site http://www.lumalaser.com/redbaron.htm shows a multi-watt green laser being aim into the cockpit from the laser point of view and the pilot's point of view, there was no damage to the pilot's eyes, distance I think was 2000 feet I have seen kliegl lights with far better collimation that reflected off Cirrus clouds, now that is bright. I did a quick calculation, lets say the pilot was 100 meters high and the beam was 1.1 millimeters in diameter then the spot size at that distance is 5.8 centimeters that's very hard to keep in one position long enough to do damage. Lower divergence would be even more difficult. This sounds like a "Chicken Little" story, you know the sky is falling.

 

[voodoogreg]

Re: Laser injures Delta pilot\'s eye

CNN is saying it was "green". I don't know anything about laser's, but have seen the banner add's here for high output green's. I am a Newbie so be nice,, but could these green laser's be modded enought to do that? VDG

 

[Lasernerd]

Re: Laser injures Delta pilot\'s eye

The laser pointers NO!
they will flash you like a high power strobe so night vision is lost temp.

 

[The_LED_Museum]

Re: Laser injures Delta pilot\'s eye

At least yellow-beam laser pointers are safe - for the moment anyway. I don't know of anybody else here on CPF besides me and a couple of UK dealers who have one. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif
And I promise not to lase aircraft with mine. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif

 

[DaFiend]

Re: Laser injures Delta pilot\'s eye

/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/bowdown.gifJeese, for a person on a fixed disability income, you got some nice stuff. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/bowdown.gif wish i had a yellow /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif

 

[The_LED_Museum]

Re: Laser injures Delta pilot\'s eye

Start a flashlight/LED/other illumination products evaluation website; you might see that yellow DPSS laser pointer in a couple of years if your website is at least reasonably popular. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif
Rough approximation here - I've had at least 50,000,000 visitors since I started my website on 10-18-99.

 

[Lasernerd]

Re: Laser injures Delta pilot\'s eye

have been in contact with FAA off and on all day today relating to this incident. They have requested that we contact the laser community about this incident. The FAA report says it was a GREEN not red laser - it entered the cockpit at 1-2 o'clock and lasted 5 seconds. The pilot knew what is was and looked away, the copilot looked at it. The ophthalmologist reports that this co-pilot has retinal burns....and will be off work for 1-3 weeks. TSA is investigating this incidence. One of the concerns is to ascertain if this was a rogue laserist or a terrorist type of event. If anyone in the laser display community has any information please contact me and I will put you in touch with FAA or relay the information to them for you.
> <snip>
> LFI works quite closely with the FAA through out this country. It has been our experience that they make every effort to accommodate our industry and advocate for our industry when needed. It has been our experience that the FAA is for the most part laser friendly with a can do attitude. We have personal experience where the FAA had been our advocates with the airlines and the military.
>

 

[Shiftlock]

Re: Laser injures Delta pilot\'s eye

One thing is for sure, it was no accident. For the beam to be on the cockpit window for 5 seconds, someone had to be very carefully tracking the plane. Imagine turning on your laser, pointing it at a plane hundreds of meters away and moving at hundreds of miles per hour, and count to yourself "one-one-thousand, two-one-thousand, three-one-thousand, four-one-thousand, five-one-thousand". I'm not sure it's possible to hold the beam steadily on the cockpit window for that long without a mount and a scope. Of course, maybe the pilots are mis-judging the time, and it was only a second. This often happens when people remember traumatic experiences. It's not uncommon for people to think an earthquake lasted over a minute when it really was only 10 seconds. Don't know...

 

[The_LED_Museum]

Re: Laser injures Delta pilot\'s eye

I was talking with a friend on the telphone yesterday, and this was the first subject that came up.
Both of our first thoughts were that the guy with the laser was "very stupid", with a few descriptive words I can't say on CPF.
I have several red lasers, a yellow laser, several green lasers, and a blue laser; and would never even THINK of shooting any of them at a vehicle of any type - on the ground OR in the air. And I stated this in no uncertain terms to my friend.

 

[RDZombie]

Re: Laser injures Delta pilot\'s eye

[ QUOTE ]
James S said:
are there even any really big red lasers?


[/ QUOTE ]

yes there are, You can pull many watts out of a krypton laser. ruby lasers are alot easier to build than you think.

[ QUOTE ]
Lasernerd said:
In Canada we are allowed to crowd scan with 3 watts of laser energy.

[/ QUOTE ]

Jesus 3 watts?!! /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wow.gif what kind of scan speeds are you running when you do that? any one know what aour limit is here in the states? id be interested to know

i dont know, i find it hard to belive some one was able to hold a beam in place on a fast moving object for that long, whoever was behind the laser had to have one hell of a steady hand and there is NO way a pointer style laser had enough power to do that.

Zombie