"Cockpit Colin" wrote:

For what it's worth, I own one of the green variety - it's great for
pointing out starts etc at night.

My feeling is that if someone shined in the cockpit from (at least) 1 or 2
miles away, ...

(a) It would give me a bit of a fright - be damned annoying, but not
damaging - possibly causing a precautionary go-around at worst.

(b) Being that the beam is visable, it should be possible to give a
pretty accurate description of where it came from.

(c) Unless you mounted it mechanically, it would be pretty hard to keep
it shining in a cockpit.

Given the current talk on the topic I'm tempted to setup a controlled test
(with an additional safety pilot) where I'll get someone to shine it at me
(perhaps from the tower) during an approach in a GA aircraft.

FYI, I'm quite sure that a Canadian Armed Forces helicopter pilot
suffered some eye damage from being hit by a powerful laser from
a Russian trawler on the West coast several years ago. It was
hushed up pretty quick but I'm fairly sure of the info.

--

--Gord
(use gordon in email)

"Without detonation, your car won't
move. That's what makes engines go".

"In my car, the high octane fuel detonates
better than the lower octane grades.
Fortunately for me, it doesn't PREVENT DETONATION".

-Burnore.

Yes, Detonation is a normal condition and
it occurs every time you have ignition,
you really need to get over that!

-Josh