The common green DPSS diode laser is emitting @ 532 nm; near the peak frequency of the Human eye. Fortunately most juveniles can't afford the more powerful devices, and the <5mw pointers, other than being a temporary distraction will produce no permanent damage to the eye. As far as your night vision where flying is concerned,
it's going out the window, and can produce temporary blindness. Inside the 5mi. airport boundary on short final @ 130 kts or so, things happen very fast and if you get nailed coming out of the cloud bases on a 200 & a 1/2 inst approach you are going to have a difficult time at touchdown or executing a miss. The autopilot set for a miss is the safest way after getting hit.
A second crewmember helps, a luxury most single engine light AC don't have. I think I would be more concerned in today's atmosphere of terrorism that something else may be following the beam. ...Such as a rifle projectile! Some folks have been removing the freq. conversion crystal from these cheap green lasers and they then emit a 808 NM beam in the IR and can fry your eye quickly as the power level is MUCH higher when unconverted and unfiltered and at the most dangerous frequency range to the Human eye.
I suffered a Laser burn on the retina from scattering of an Excimer (Exciplex) UV Laser during a legitimate medical lab ablation experiment back in the 1970's and the small burn spot is still there! It was a light leak (defect) in my laser goggles.
Improperly aimed and controlled, this high power UV laser could burn a hole through your eye and the back of your head!
I once watched an IR 10.6 micron flowing gas CW (continuous wave) Co2 laser being fired for the 1st time at a lab in So. Cal at Union Carbide's KORAD Division in the mid 60's. It burned through the MANY multiple layers of refractory firebrick backstop, the back cement brick wall of the building, and completely through a cars body and transmission in the parking lot to scatter and dissipate in an empty field behind the building. It only was rated at 10kw, small by today's standards. Fortunately, not many can afford that kind of Laser horsepower, but it's out there!
Some Jihadist Flash Gordon moron will no doubt try to cut an aircraft in two at some point if they can get the equipment together. Actually you can build a very powerful cutting laser for a couple hundred bucks and some junk off the scrap pile.
P.S. I'm still able to get a 1st class medical though and 16500 turbine hours later, still have no problem passing the eye exam.
Check out these guys.
Red, Blue, Green Laser Pointer and Torch Flashlight - Wicked Lasers Perpetrators of Mayhem.