Aircraft being attacked by lasers

[the Interceptor]

Interesting hypothetical.

Now ask yourself, how one would enforce a law against shining a laser at a plane? You can't. Things like an address, intersection, or what the perpetrator is wearing will be impossible to identify from an airliner. You can make something illegal until you're blue in the face, but unless there's adequate enforcement, the law is pointless.

Absolutely!

The next logical step in this thought experiment would be an outright ban on laser pointers. And that is a very-very slippery slope.

Banning a product b/c it 'can' be used in a harmful manner will most certainly lead lawmakers into the realm of ridiculousness.

Now lets take your scenario and instead of laser pointers and airplanes, replace them with wood nails and school buses. Would you or anyone call for the outright ban on nails b/c it can cause a tire failure and a gruesome death? No, you wouldn't. Nails, like baseball bats and kitchen knives, are useful tools that can be misused to cause harm. The only difference is that there isn't any data to show how many people have crashed their planes b/c of a laser pointer.

The important bit of this discussion is that the idea of banning laser pointers can not be cloned directly for other devices. One can use almost anything as a weapon, and it would make zero sense to ban all these things. That however doesn't mean that a laser pointer ban wouldn't make sense either. It is an isolated and very specific case, and a case in which a ban might make a difference.

I'd really like to see the calculus on this. Things like approach speed & the angle needed to shine a laser into the pilots's eye would probably squash the argument as someone on the ground would have to be quite a distance away.

To disturb a landing sequence, a laser pointer doesn't necessarily have to hit the eyes of the pilot directly. It might be enough to shine the laser beam into the cockpit to distract the pilot momentarily. Also, the laser beam can generate an area of glare in the windscreen and confuse the pilot that way.

 

[BrutherSuperior]

Absolutely!

The important bit of this discussion is that the idea of banning laser pointers can not be cloned directly for other devices. One can use almost anything as a weapon, and it would make zero sense to ban all these things. That however doesn't mean that a laser pointer ban wouldn't make sense either. It is an isolated and very specific case, and a case in which a ban might make a difference.

You can formulate almost any 'product' into the same argument, and that's the 'slippery slope'.

Out of the hundreds of thousands of flights, how many have been brought down because of a laser pointer being used? Zero? Banning a product b/c of a problem that does not exist is not smart policy. It sure isn't about airline safety...that's another topic though.

To disturb a landing sequence, a laser pointer doesn't necessarily have to hit the eyes of the pilot directly. It might be enough to shine the laser beam into the cockpit to distract the pilot momentarily. Also, the laser beam can generate an area of glare in the windscreen and confuse the pilot that way.

Now you're just reaching. Instead of playing the 'what if' game, how about the math?

 

[RC45]

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[OG_Wretch]

I don't know RC45, you know how flighty those pilot types are...



I'll get my hat an coat.

 

[RC45]

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[Tesla]

It would be pretty awesome if the airline industry develops a laser that can accurately fire a laser beam right back at the idiot trying to blind the pilot.

And the laser fired back is a hundred times stronger.

What if "the idiot" managed to acquired that laser?

 

[sumbrownkid]

What if "the idiot" managed to acquired that laser?

Then the police will have no problem tracking the laser beam to the idiot.

 

[Tesla]

Then the police will have no problem tracking the laser beam to the idiot.

Ahh, but how will they subdue him? He has an incredibly bright laser. He can just shine it at them.

 

[niky]

Such a laser, installed on an aircraft with auto-guidance, would probably cost enough so that very few idiots can get a hold of them.

Sometimes, when we're sitting in an auditorium or stadium during a show, I wish that they'd have something similar installed over the stage. Laser pointer clicks on... bam... gigantic trillion candlepower searchlight on tight beam points straight at the person holding it. Giving him a nice suntan and temporary blindness, in the process.

 

[Tesla]

Such a laser, installed on an aircraft with auto-guidance, would probably cost enough so that very few idiots can get a hold of them.

Sometimes, when we're sitting in an auditorium or stadium during a show, I wish that they'd have something similar installed over the stage. Laser pointer clicks on... bam... gigantic trillion candlepower searchlight on tight beam points straight at the person holding it. Giving him a nice suntan and temporary blindness, in the process.

But can you account for any plane-jacking that may occur to these planes, due to the high weaponry(?) value of that laser? Or, if the plane crashes, one of these lasers could be salvaged by any idiots near the crash site. The likelihood of this is incredibly low, of course, but, again, should one know of the potential value of these lasers, they could easily fire some sort of weaponry at the plane.

To save you the trouble, I'll counter my own statement. If the idiot who wanted to shine bright shiny things at aircraft was so stupid as to be doing it, there is no way that without outside help that he could do any of things that I have listed above.

 

[sumbrownkid]

Ahh, but how will they subdue him? He has an incredibly bright laser. He can just shine it at them.

The Tom and Jerry principle strikes again!.

 

[blaaah]

The latest development in laser weapons is for the provision of self defence to international shipping in the dangerous pirate laden seas off the East coast of Africa. The laser has a beam meters wide and has a range over 1km. It is designed to be aimed at the pirates in their small boats causing them to be distracted (temporarily blinded probably) and to stop them aiming their rifles and RPG's which will give time for the ship to evade capture.
I expect pirate ships to carry large forward mirrors in the future...

 

[OG_Wretch]

Hmmmm, seems a grand idea how about:
Airborne laser platform testing

 

[Tesla]

The latest development in laser weapons is for the provision of self defence to international shipping in the dangerous pirate laden seas off the East coast of Africa. The laser has a beam meters wide and has a range over 1km. It is designed to be aimed at the pirates in their small boats causing them to be distracted (temporarily blinded probably) and to stop them aiming their rifles and RPG's which will give time for the ship to evade capture.
I expect pirate ships to carry large forward mirrors in the future...

Metres wide? How far would they go if they were focused onto a single point, i.e 5-25mm across?
EDIT: Has anyone seen that Mythbusters episode where they set fire to a boat using mirrors?

 

[blaaah]

Link to BAE systems news page, they created it:
http://www.baesystems.com/Newsroom/NewsReleases/autoGen_111010105948.html

I saw the Mythbusters episode, they tried to set fire to a boat with a large array of mirrors, but at best it slightly warmed it. They had trouble lighting it with flaming arrows, in the end they gave up.

 

[hambone8611]

I think you’re going to need more than a double A battery to power this thing.

 

[Tesla]

No idea, maybe it's beam is fixed and cant be changed for safety/legal reasons. If it could send a wide beam over 1km which can disrupt vision then a narrow beam would burn a hole in the boat maybe, but also make holes in people, and if you wanted that you might awsell just shoot regular bullets or a cannon.

They're pirates. Need I say more? EDIT: Read your post wrong. But thanks for providing that link.

And when they returned to the Myth due to fan mail, they showed a video of a University achieving it, from a distance.

 

[Duke]

Thank you - on final approach you are in a nose-up attitude. Thsi would require the "kid with the laser pointer" to be ahead of and above the approaching aircraft.

No, actually, not until the flare, shortly before touchdown. Before that the plane is nose down ond on a direct trajectory / angle of attack toward the threshold of the runway. And to fly IFR, the pilot still needs to be able to SEE the INSTRUMENTS, even if he isn't looking outside the cockpit itself, no? Kinda tough to do that with retina damage.

 

[RC45]

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[Joel]

OK -having run this scenario passed a number of pilots I know (including my own father a 10,000+ hour big jet jockey) to a T they all said "Far worse things to worry about than an off chance of a laser pointer blinding you on approach - bird strike, wind sheer, hydraulic failure, electrical failure,other traffic etc etc.

And not wanting to get too pedantic but your approach is relatively level. mayb 2*, 3* at the steepest yeah? So your pilots eyes are still many many miles from the airport when the "kid with a laser pointer" has an apparent clear path to the retina. As they close the distance the "cone of blindness" narrows rapidly, until at the last moment, when you are maybe 1/3 mile out the real "danger zone' is entered - and now the craft is moving quickly relative to the "kid with the laser pointer" and he/she better have riflemount and scope to aim the beam at the pilots eyes.

Common sense might suggest that you have more chance of getting retina damage from a grocery store checkout barcode laser than you are from a $1.99 laser pointer at 5 miles out being waved about a 6th grader.

*edit* Ah what the hell. Pilots are blinded by the dozens everyday. These laser pointers are a menace to society. For the sake of the children, ban the laser pointers.

Just FYI, I severely doubt that Duke would be in support of a laser pointer ban.

 

[RC45]

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[Famine]

And a double-FYI, it doesn't need to hit the front screen, as the video I posted of I-99 - the Metropolitan Police's helicopter - earlier in the thread.

 

[the Interceptor]

You can formulate almost any 'product' into the same argument, and that's the 'slippery slope'.

I agree as far that the idea of banning laser pointers is not a completely solid case, rather than a "workaround". Like I said, it is a case to be regarded individually. It can not be extrapolated to other devices just like that, because no other freely-available device enables a person to do potential harm to an aircraft in the proposed situations like a laser pointer does.

Out of the hundreds of thousands of flights, how many have been brought down because of a laser pointer being used? Zero? Banning a product b/c of a problem that does not exist is not smart policy. It sure isn't about airline safety...that's another topic though.

The FAA has issued two studies on this topic:

"Laser Pointers: Their Potential Affects(sic) on Vision and Aviation Safety", Van B. Nakagawara, DOT/FAA/AM-01/7, April 2001

"June 2004 FAA follow-up study: "The Effects of Laser Illumination on Operational and Visual Performance of Pilots During Final Approach", DOT/FAA/AM-04/9

I quote:

The purpose of this report was to investigate the illumination of aircraft by laser pointers in the National Airspace System.

CASE REPORTS. From January 1996 to July 1999, the FAA’s Western-Pacific Region identified more than 150 incidents in which low-flying aircraft were illuminated by lasers. Laser pointers were used in the majority of these incidents, and there were several occurrences of visual impairment to the pilot. Representative examples of documented reports are presented that involved the illumination of civilian flight crewmembers by these hand-held devices.

CONCLUSIONS. Laser pointers have caused ocular injury and may compromise aviation safety when used to illuminate aircraft in critical phases of flight.

Now you're just reaching. Instead of playing the 'what if' game, how about the math?

The danger from laser pointer illumination is the visible beam hitting an aircraft’s windshield, which can scatter light and completely obliterate a pilot’s forward vision.

What
absolute
tripe.

If you as a pilot are that easily distracted durign an already high-stress high-alert activity as an approach, you have no business in the cockpit.

In the end, even pilots are just people. People make mistakes. Pilots are trained to be prepared for a lot of different occurrences, there are safety and backup systems and in the end, of course, a copilot. Yet, and especially in a high-stress-situation, a laser beam may come unexpected and disturb a pilot momentarily.

What
absolute
tripe.

Again, if some windshield glare causes a pilot of a commercial airliner full of nuns and children to suddenly veer the aircraft in an airframe destroying turn the pilot has no business being in the cockpit.

Approximately 75% of the responses solicited from subjects indicated they had experienced adverse visual effects resulting in some degree of operational difficulty when illuminated by eye-safe levels of laser radiation during final approach maneuvers. Even at the lowest level of laser exposure (0.5 µW/cm2), two-thirds of the responses indicated that subjects experienced glare (36%), flash-blindness (18%), and afterimages (13%), at least while the laser stimulus was present. These responses and a missed approach associated with the lowest level of laser exposure in this study confirm that laser illumination of flight crewmembers in the LFZ at or above 0.5 µW/cm2 should be avoided. In addition, when illuminated by the two higher laser exposure levels (5 and 50 µW/cm2), subjects missed eight approaches, relinquished command to the co-pilot once, and indicated they had significantly (p < 0.05) greater operational and visual performance problems compared to the lowest exposure level.

Oh - and one more little detail - IF it where so easy and so simple and so DEADLY then the US military (and others) would already have battle-deployed "pilot blinding laser" weapons in the hands of every ground troups hands (especially since they are $1.99 laser pointers) and you can be sure that the worlds terrorists would have already perfected the use of such $1.99 weapons and be bringing down planes every other Thursday and twice on Sunday.

Puhlease let's try stay within the slight realm of reality here.

If a laser pointer were a weapon safe to bring down aircrafts one by one, it would probably have been a technique applied by terrorists. But if this were the case, I think the appropriate authorities would have taken measures to prevent that already. Noone ever claimed that a laser pointer is a deadly weapon which will bring down any plane within seconds. That however doesn't mean that a laser pointer can't pose a substantial threat to aviation safety. At least the FAA thinks so, or even thought so ten years ago when there were much less cases. The point is that they don't want to wait until a plane actually crashes because of a laser pointer incident.

 

[RC45]

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[Duke]

How is it a non-issue? Those reports seem to state that it can be an issue, and real aircraft have had to abort landing approaches or hand over control to the copilot during landing due to laser targeting. I don't really see how that's "still a non-issue after 15 years".

I don't see a laser pointer ban helping in any way at all, but that does not mean that laser pointers are a "non-issue".

 

[BrutherSuperior]

"Laser Pointers: Their Potential Affects(sic) on Vision and Aviation Safety", Van B. Nakagawara, DOT/FAA/AM-01/7, April 2001

"The purpose of this report is to evaluate the performance of pilots exposed to visible laser radiation during final approach maneuvers at 100 feet above the runway in the Laser-Free Zone (LFZ)."

In most basic terms; they shot lasers into a pilot's eye while they flew a sim and recorded the results. What's missing are the angles and distances a person would have to be in order to shine a laser into a pilot's eye from the ground.

"June 2004 FAA follow-up study: "The Effects of Laser Illumination on Operational and Visual Performance of Pilots During Final Approach", DOT/FAA/AM-04/9

"Laser pointers have caused ocular injury and may compromise aviation safety when used to illuminate aircraft in critical phases of flight."

The conclusion of their study is a "maybe".

Of all the things that can make air travel more safe and convenient, laser pointers should be on the bottom of the list.

There's no need to rush into anything, pass any new laws, or ban certain products b/c of a 'maybe' from, in my opinion, an incomplete article. With some simple math, you can figure out the distances/angles you'd need to have a situation where a pilot is blinded. Since something so simple was left out of the report and respective follow-up report; my guess it didn't give them the answer they wanted.

Seriously; do the math and let us know what you come up with.

 

[the Interceptor]

"Laser Pointers: Their Potential Affects(sic) on Vision and Aviation Safety", Van B. Nakagawara, DOT/FAA/AM-01/7, April 2001

"The purpose of this report is to evaluate the performance of pilots exposed to visible laser radiation during final approach maneuvers at 100 feet above the runway in the Laser-Free Zone (LFZ)."

In most basic terms; they shot lasers into a pilot's eye while they flew a sim and recorded the results. What's missing are the angles and distances a person would have to be in order to shine a laser into a pilot's eye from the ground.

... which basically is irrelevant, because it is already happening:

From January 1996 to July 1999, the FAA&#8217;s Western-Pacific Region identified more than 150 incidents in which low-flying aircraft were illuminated by lasers. Laser pointers were used in the majority of these incidents, and there were several occurrences of visual impairment to the pilot.

"June 2004 FAA follow-up study: "The Effects of Laser Illumination on Operational and Visual Performance of Pilots During Final Approach", DOT/FAA/AM-04/9

"Laser pointers have caused ocular injury and may compromise aviation safety when used to illuminate aircraft in critical phases of flight."

The conclusion of their study is a "maybe".

It's not a maybe, it's a may. When a pilot is blinded with a laser beam either directly or indirectly, it may compromise the safety of his flight. That's a different thing.

Of all the things that can make air travel more safe and convenient, laser pointers should be on the bottom of the list.

Well, at least you acknowledge that they're on the list.

There's no need to rush into anything, pass any new laws, or ban certain products b/c of a 'maybe' from, in my opinion, an incomplete article. With some simple math, you can figure out the distances/angles you'd need to have a situation where a pilot is blinded. Since something so simple was left out of the report and respective follow-up report; my guess it didn't give them the answer they wanted.

Seriously; do the math and let us know what you come up with.

Like I said, there is no point in doing the math because this is aready happening.

You know, I find it perfectly reasonable of you to argue that there should not be a law to ban laser pointers. I completely understand your position and can well live with your decision. What I have a problem with however is that you are trying to argue that one can not hit the cockpit of an airplane with a laser pointer when there are credible sources who clearly say that this has happened several times already.

 

[G.T.Ace]

Also interesting to read the comments (pilot posted himself).

 

[BrutherSuperior]

You know, I find it perfectly reasonable of you to argue that there should not be a law to ban laser pointers. I completely understand your position and can well live with your decision. What I have a problem with however is that you are trying to argue that one can not hit the cockpit of an airplane with a laser pointer when there are credible sources who clearly say that this has happened several times already.

The 1st video you posted; the laser was hitting the plane from a 9 o'clock position. The 2nd video states it was from a 3 o'clock position.

If you're a passenger, you might get a laser shined on you. If you're a pilot flying a 737, I still don't see how someone can shine a laser into your eye.

Show me the math.

 

[the Interceptor]

The 1st video you posted; the laser was hitting the plane from a 9 o'clock position. The 2nd video states it was from a 3 o'clock position.

I didn't post any videos.

If you're a passenger, you might get a laser shined on you. If you're a pilot flying a 737, I still don't see how someone can shine a laser into your eye.

Show me the math.

You obviously are in denial of the situation, so there is no point in going over this with you anymore.