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Old 15th Jun 2008, 04:17
  #31 (permalink)  
Airbubba
 
Join Date: Jun 2001
Location: Rockytop, Tennessee, USA
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the milliwatt lasers used to capture headlines and “tag” aircraft are, almost without exception, inexpensive diode based green laser “pointers”. Their wavelength (525nm) is very close to that of the peak spectral sensitivity of the human eye at 555nm.
Actually, the familiar green DPSS lasers emit at a wavelength of 532 nm. Most of the other numbers seem reasonable to me. Still, there is considerable discussion about what is a 'safe' level of laser light exposure. Also, even temporary flash blindness can be bad news in an aircraft near the ground.

Here's an account of a flash blindness incident involving an amateur astronomer at a star party:

http://sci.tech-archive.net/Archive/...5-01/0019.html
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