[AZ-Observing] Re: Phoenix man sentenced for shining laser at two commercial airliners, police helicopter over Valley

  • From: "Rick Tejera" <saguaroastro@xxxxxxx>
  • To: <az-observing@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Thu, 9 Aug 2012 10:24:29 -0700

Dan, 

Exactly my point. In one of Tom Clancy's novels (Executive Orders, I
believe) there was a plot line where Mr Clark & Ding Chavez are under cover
in Japan (Who has declared war on the US). They take up residence in a
building conveniently at the end of a runway at a Japanese military base and
use a high powered laser to blind & paralyze pilots of the Japanese version
of the AWACS on short final causing them to crash, seemingly, to the
Japanese, for no apparent reason. 

Rick Tejera (K7TEJ)
Sagauro Astronomy Club
www.saguaroastro.org
Thunderbird Amatuer Radio Club
www.w7tbc.org
30 Meter Digital Group # 5794


-----Original Message-----
From: az-observing-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:az-observing-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Dan Heim
Sent: Thursday, 09 August, 2012 10:18
To: az-observing@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [AZ-Observing] Re: Phoenix man sentenced for shining laser at two
commercial airliners, police helicopter over Valley

Yeah, I've wondered about that too. Wicked advertises a 1000 mW laser, and
somehow manages to sell it stateside. I've seen one of these demonstrated,
and it was able to burst a balloon on the other side of an auditorium, as
well as ignite a match a close range. Pretty impressive output!

And your comment about choppers being more vulnerable makes perfect sense.
Airliners at altitude, though, would seem fairly impervious to your average
laser pointer. When you take beam divergence and angle of incidence into
account, there ain't gonna be that much laser light entering the cockpit.

Now on take-off or landing approaches, there's the real hazard.

Dan Heim


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