UPS Pilots and Lazers

Wally

BrownCafe Innovator & King of Puns
What's a Lazer?
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FrigidFTSup

Resident Suit
Unless these things have some sort of extraordinary range on them that I'm unaware if, I have to wonder why the hell they were flying so low over Martinsburg if they were on their way from Pittsburgh to Philadelphia.
Judging by the radar data they should have been between 21,000-25,000 feet at that point. Surprisingly not out of the range of some of those laser pointers. Even the smallest ones come with warning labels on them.

Hopefully they catch the fool who did it. Someone is going to crash one day because someone thought it was funny to point one of those things in a cockpit.
 

Bottom rung

Well-Known Member
So....how do they project the laser into a cockpit 20,000 feet above them? I'm assuming the person pointing the laser was on the ground.
 

FrigidFTSup

Resident Suit
So....how do they project the laser into a cockpit 20,000 feet above them? I'm assuming the person pointing the laser was on the ground.
You just point it at the airplane and sometimes it hits the cockpit. Most laser pointers aimed at aircraft don't actually hit the flight deck, or if they do, don't hit the pilots. But they're easy to spot on the ground. Usually you can mark it on your moving map and alert ATC who will then notify law enforcement.
 
Yeah, and they can be modded to increase output very cheaply and easily also.
The thing is, most folks doing this can't actually see if it hits the plane. They may point it to see if it reaches that far, but can't tell if it does. Check out the wiki on this subject, it shows what the pilots see from their perspective. My guess is that the majority of these instances are just kids playing around.
 

sailfish

Master of Karate and Friendship for Everyone
Judging by the radar data they should have been between 21,000-25,000 feet at that point. Surprisingly not out of the range of some of those laser pointers. Even the smallest ones come with warning labels on them.

Hopefully they catch the fool who did it. Someone is going to crash one day because someone thought it was funny to point one of those things in a cockpit.
Interesting. I never would have thought.
 

moldsporh

Well-Known Member
So....how do they project the laser into a cockpit 20,000 feet above them? I'm assuming the person pointing the laser was on the ground.


It's the spot to distance ratio. Depends on the laser, but they generally increase in size the farther out you go. A plane at 5000 feet or especially higher, will have the entire cockpit engulfed in a blinding light, but you will only see a small dot on your hand because it's close.

It's extremely dangerous and satellites can spot them easily if they are looking for them due to the large target they give at high altitudes.
 

Bottom rung

Well-Known Member
It's the spot to distance ratio. Depends on the laser, but they generally increase in size the farther out you go. A plane at 5000 feet or especially higher, will have the entire cockpit engulfed in a blinding light, but you will only see a small dot on your hand because it's close.

It's extremely dangerous and satellites can spot them easily if they are looking for them due to the large target they give at high altitudes.
Thank you. That's what I was looking for.
 

rod

Retired 22 years
So....how do they project the laser into a cockpit 20,000 feet above them? I'm assuming the person pointing the laser was on the ground.


Have you ever looked out the window of a plane at night and saw a light down below? Now pretend that is a lazer.
 
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