Nailed by a laser the other night....

Lindberg said:
Please identify the "unverified statistics" in my post. :rolleyes2::dunno::confused:
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Lindberg said:
I don't doubt that it's distracting, but aside from a single, unverified report from a pilot's union, what evidence is there of serious danger from this? If you believe the FAA, this is happening tens of thousands of times a year, without causing a single reported incident.
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Bolded.
 
Lindberg said:
You got awfully twisted over me saying "incident" when I meant "accident." I'm still looking for the examples where flight safety was actually at risk.
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I can't infer what was meant, only what was in the post.

And I do have an issue with someone pointing a multi-watt laser at anyone's eyes, not just a pilots. These are hundreds to a thousand times more powerful than an office pointer. They can be easily bought online, can cause significant and permanent damage in an instant, and even incidents should be treated seriously.
 
This might have been related to this year's Christmas fad - lazy lights. If you haven't seen them already, it's an apparatus that projects laser lights onto your house indiscriminately to simulate the effect of covering your house in Christmas lights. Pretty neat effect, for sure, but definitely causing a lot of lasers to be projected up into the sky. See this article: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/holiday-laser-displays-raising-safety-concerns-for-pilots/
 
I believe a Russian vessel permanently (or seriously) damaged a U.S. military pilot's vision with a laser, a long while back. Details are sketchy for me now - I seem to recall it was a Navy helo, but could definitely be wrong.

Could be there's already a smoking hole or two from laser blinding - we wouldn't know it, would we, if a VFR night flight on final was tagged? I mean, if something goes sideways when I'm flying, the radio isn't usually the first (or second) button I'm pushing. . .

I had a random air bag deployment a few years back - no impact, no accelerations, just boom - if I had lost control, hit someone head-on, or ate a telephone pole, no one would have known what happened.
 
Sundancer said:
I had a random air bag deployment a few years back - no impact, no accelerations, just boom - if I had lost control, hit someone head-on, or ate a telephone pole, no one would have known what happened.
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This scares the hell out of me.
 
ElPaso Pilot said:
1413474164075_wps_74_A_lout_holds_up_a_bottle_.jpg
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No...way!!! That looks like a beer bottle in that person's hand.:eek: :hairraise: :yikes:


Laying all jokes aside, how much time did they get sentenced?
 
So I teach high school, and invariably every year some idiot kid shines a laser down the hallways. I got blinded by a green laser a couple of years ago... actually left a feeling of pain. I tried to track down the idiot kid but couldn't find him. Probably a good thing because if I did I may have punched him in the face.
 
DMD3. said:
No...way!!! That looks like a beer bottle in that person's hand.:eek: :hairraise: :yikes:


Laying all jokes aside, how much time did they get sentenced?
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Per the article referenced, seven months in prison, suspended for two years and 250 hours of unpaid work.
 
Timbeck2 said:
Tell ATC as soon as possible so they can mark your spot on the scope. ATC then calls the authorities and make a broadcast to every aircraft that come into our airspace about the laser for an hour. It has happened while I was working about a dozen times this year in Tucson. I've never been lasered myself...yet.

Some kids decided to laser Air One which is the police helicopter here. They were caught within two minutes.
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Sometime last year I was on the east ramp at Tucson down the street from the police hangar listening to tower. An airliner reported being lased and TPD had its helicopter in the air within a minute. Then they reported being lased and promptly directed ground units to the location.
 
I got lasered when flying over Burbank. They already had a police helo coming to look for the guy. I was able to give them a pretty good location to look. Didn't ever find out if they caught them or not but it was kinda fun to give directions to a police helicopter :)
 
I remember hearing about a guy that got lazed around dusk. He followed the light, circled the house, got a description of the guy, called ATC, and kept circling until the cops got there. Proceeded to land. Turns out the cops didn't do anything because the guy denied he did it. :dunno:
 
Manderson said:
This scares the hell out of me.
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It was in a 1995 Chrysler; the "old" airbags, the ones that deployed full force, regardless of the acceleration. I think the mandate was that the bag had to protect an occupant even without seat belt/ harness being worn.

Guess they thought it was better to kill few small framed people, in order to save many more less safety concious folks.

Late fall, windows closed, so the over pressure blew out the front windows each side, and also the air vents. My left hand was on top of the wheel, and it launched my arm straight up, into the windshield. Did my elbow no good, and broke my watch. Spilled some blood getting out over the crumbled glass on the passenger side.
 
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