cwatters
 

You might want to read the mentioned article again- the rockets can go to 13K, but the aircraft were on departure from the airport.

Stop! This thread should be deleted! Don't let the Taliban know!
They will throw away all their stingers and AK's and will down the Apaches with flashlights!

BTW, This guy (article in dutch) was sentenced €150 after targeting a (police!) helicopter with a laserpen

Allegedly the cluprit has professional experieince lighting flying choppers at air displays, so he might well have more idea than the average civilian.

Also given that it was a military helicopter and the incident was at a "farmhouse" in a rural area, they could well be flying very very low. Low flying military helicopters have been implicated in the deaths of horseriders in the UK.


The question it begs for me is, if you are buzzed by a low flying aircraft at night, how the heck do you get the tail number to complain without shining some kind of light ? I would have thought there was a difference between shining a (diffuse) torch at the tail and a concentrated green alser at the cockpit window, but it appears not... :(

I thought he had experience of lighting up Helicopters....I suppose that makes him even more qualified than flying one??!!

Infrequent.... shining a torch to get an aircrafts tail number at night? ........are you :mad: serious?

Their was an incident near Heathrow a few weeks back involving a laser attack.
It was about 23.00 and Police Helicopter North of Heathrow was almost lasered, I remember the Crew Radioing Heathrow and Swanwick to telling the area of the laser attack to try and avoid that area.

West Yorkshire had a yoof sent down for 6 months yesterday at Bradford Crown Court for a similar offence.
Thanks your honour :ok:


Judge locks up man who shone light at police while 'messing about' (From Bradford Telegraph and Argus)

Police laser conviction London
 

From Rotorheads:-Today at Blackfriars Crown Court, a defendant was found guilty of endangering the safety of an aircraft in flight. He had been targetting the Met Police helicopter with a green l@ser and has been given a 12 month sentence.

Torbin Merriott has been told the Police are going to NFA his case! His interview on the local media was very telling as he referred to 'another of those wretched helicopters'

The torch looks like one of those 5 million candlepower (allegedly) ones and the beam isn't that diffuse. If it was pitch balck as he's claiming, then I suppoer he'd have to light up the whole a/c to find the tail. I suspect the crew were using NVG too which would increase the effect of the torch. If the account is true, the rainge involved is a lost less than most l@ser attacks.

Torben Merriott
 

I had a brief correspondence with Torben Merriott. He wrote that he did not spot the helicopters (I assume he means he didn't see them lit up, indicating a fast flash instead of holding the light steady). He also said the pilot reported that the light came from the right rear; it lit up the cockpit but did not go directly (head-on) into his night-vision goggles. If I understand press reports, only one of the two helicopters was illuminated.

Torben stated the illuminated helicopter was very close to his house, that it climbed from 10 ft to 600 ft.

Hope this clarifies questions about tail numbers etc. Maybe it raises more questions (10 ft sounds awfully low) but that's what Torben said and that's the only info I have at this time from him.

Minimum laser power to cause problems
 

keesje wrote: I only read the first 35 posts, so maybe it has come up. What is minimum l@ser power that could be used to cause problems in a cockpit?

The FAA, working with experts, set various levels. Less than 50 nanowatts per sq. cm. (0.05 microwatts per sq. cm.) is deemed to not cause distraction. At this level, the light does not stand out against other nighttime lights seen from the sky.

Glare occurs around 5 microwatts per sq. cm. It is hard or impossible to see around the glare.

Flashblindness occurs around 100 microwatts per sq. cm. These temporarily blind a pilot and can leave afterimages lingering for seconds or even minutes.

Note that the above is irradiance: light power spread over an area. This is different than beam power, which is how pointers are measured (how much light comes out, irregardless of whether the beam is tight or spreads out a lot).

The eye is most sensitive to green light. If you have a green beam and red beam of equal power, the green appears much brighter (therefore distracting/glaring) than the red one.

A green pointer of 5 milliwatts (the legal limit to sell as a pointer in the U.S.) can cause flashblindness to about 250 feet, glare to about 1,200 feet, and can be a distraction over 2 miles away.

A green pointer of 125 milliwatts has a visual effect 5 times greater, so it causes flashblindness to 1300 feet, glare to 1.1 miles, and can be a distraction over 11 miles away.

There is NO reason to ever aim a pointer at or near an aircraft. (Well, one legitimate consumer reason, which is to signal a search-and-rescue aircraft when one is truly lost.)

Hope this answers your question.

Rwy 32 doesn`t exist , it was Rwy 10 I believe. It was the FlyBe that was lasered. Skipper interviewed by the feds then flight departed a few mins later no probs.

-jd

Multiple laser incidents in my company over the past weeks in the London area and also into GLA. They even tagetted a Met Police helicopter with a green laser light just before they turned to us. :ok:

Another laser shone at the BA2597 from Verona around 5:30 yesterday evening. Police met the a/c to take statements. This is getting silly. What sort of idiots think this is funny?

There was at least one green laser incident yesterday targetting LTN aircraft.

Teenager apologises fof laser on Police Helecopter
 

From the BBC;

BBC NEWS | UK | Wales | South East Wales | 'Sorry' for helicopter laser beam

http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared.../news_logo.gif
'Sorry' for helicopter laser beam

A teenager who endangered the lives of a police helicopter crew by shining a laser pen at the aircraft has apologised in person to them.
Dennis, 17, from Caerphilly county, was later tracked down by the police by using the video equipment onboard the helicopter he had targeted in July.
He visited RAF St Athan to meet the crew and say sorry as part of a restorative justice programme.
The pilot, Captain James Grenfell, said he fully accepted the apology.
The meeting was organised by Caerphilly's Youth Offending Service to show Dennis the implications of his actions.
During the visit, he was shown around the Eurocopter craft used by both South Wales Police and Gwent Police.
Two of the aircrew, Pc Mark Chamberlain and Captain Grenfell, explained the impact Dennis' behaviour had on their safety and the potentially tragic consequences of his actions.
He offered his apologies to the crew for the incident.
'Not malicious'
Captain Grenfell said following the meeting: "From our meeting, Dennis has learned how dangerous this type of incident can be, and I hope that others will understand the same lesson.
"After speaking to him, I felt that it was not done maliciously and I fully accept his apology."
The youth offending service said the aim of such meetings was to provide an offender with the opportunity to take responsibility for their actions and acknowledge the consequences without humiliating them.
Caerphilly cabinet member for the environment, Lyn Ackerman, said: "Restorative justice meetings such as this one can be very positive experiences for all concerned. "They really can help reduce stress and fear among victims, and can also be very effective in helping to motivate young offenders to turn away from a life of crime."

Story from BBC NEWS:
BBC NEWS | UK | Wales | South East Wales | 'Sorry' for helicopter laser beam

Published: 2009/10/26 13:16:13 GMT

Had someone zapping a l@ser at one of our aircraft this evening. Have just debriefed our pilot.

Green l@ser flashing into cockpit just after take-off from Oxford Airport.

Unluckily for the tw:mad:t who was doing it - the guy flying our aircraft lives locally and knew exactly what area the beam was coming from. He reported the incident to Oxford Approach who passed it on to the Police who have just arrested a 12 year old boy. Another aircraft also reported l@ser activity just after we'd left the circuit.

This is the second l@ser incident this week. On Monday someone on the ground was shining a beam into the cockpit overhead Twyford at 2000ft.

Worrying.

TrafficPilot

Twice this week into Newcastle for me. And each time from different places - once from South Shields and once from Washington area.

The one from Washington was on my side of the aircraft and caught me square in the eye, thankfully the police helicopter was out and about.

Whether they caught the culprit, I have no idea. But this is now getting absolutly ridiculous... Almost to the extent that now on approach into NCL, we expect to get it at some stage.