Medical Flight Hit by Laser!

[Photonz]

Actaully IR is very hazardous to our health... It encourages extreme laziness by helping us turn on our entertainment advices without getting off the couch and encourages us to stay up all night and get sleep deprivation by making it possible to see outside at night

 

[Zeebit]

Oh no my green pen pisses IR so much it burnt the hair off my ass just by looking at the dot. Maybe I should get an IR filter for my ass.

 

[Tmack]

Lmao. There is some ir nazi sitting there reading this thread absolutely tearing out his hair right now.

" these idiots will be blind in two weeks, ahhhhhhhhh!"

 

[Photonz]

Oh no my green pen pisses IR so much it burnt the hair off my ass just by looking at the dot. Maybe I should get an IR filter for my ass.

I read that farts contain dangerous levels of IR radiation that is focused through the rectum and emitted as an intense pulsed beam. The FDA is looking into mass producing IR protective goggles for people to wear when entering a restroom. I recommend getting a patent for the RIRF (Rectal Infra Red Filter of course) and develop a prototype for recreational bowel use.

 

[J0SHUA]

and let me (and most of us I suspect) give zero fucks.

Exactly zero, yesiree

I wouldn't think someone who has the ability to find an Actual powerful green laser (above 500mW) would think it was a good idea to point it at a helicopter. Usually those kind of people who point their lasers at aircrafts end up buying their lasers from sketchy sites that advertise their green lasers at 2W for $50(when they are actually 50mW).
Honestly, this story doesn't seem to add up...
1. It would take someone who did their research and found an actual powerful 532nm/520nm laser
2. That person would have to be willing to spend around $1000+ for the laser
3. But, that same person would have to have no common sense and purposefully aim the laser at any window/cockpit to try to hit someone...

IMO I think they are exaggerating the story by calling it a burn and leaving out the part when his sight returns to normal in a day or two.

This is kinda what I was thinking...

^ ill waste my time

A cheap eBay pen is not doing that kind of damage to a heli pilot. It may hit him and temporary disorient him if he was hit absolutely directly , but as far as burning his eye. No.

You would need a SERIOS laser to burn someone's eye at that distance, and a eBay pen, no matter how super overspec it is and how much ir ( even if 100%) wouldn't do damage. The ir would not travel that far to begin with.

(Time sufficiently wasted )

Tmack, thank you for not only wasting your time, but also for shedding some light on the bull$%!# in the article...

a bit IRrational... :crackup:

That was awesome.

I don't understand IR hysteria at all. The laser is going to damage your eye if it hits it, end of. I have a laser pen that leaks IR - it shows up readily in ordinary photos alongside the 532 emission, I don't treat it any differently than the other one which doesn't emit IR. If it annoys that much, buy an IR filter and shut up...

I want to put all this IR stuff in my pipe and smoke it

All kidding aside, how harmful is it really, or, how much needs to be leaked to be considered harmful???

 

[CheeseHasLeafs]

recreational bowel use.

uhuh... recreational. Uh.

I agree though, I don't see how the IR is any more damaging than the green portion. Unless you got a laser that had crappy alignment and put out a very tiny bit of green and mainly IR.
Even then, if you pointed any laser in your eye you wouldn't be a very well informed sort of person.
Really the only trouble I have with IR is that it isn't the 'targeted' output and therefore not desirable, but the mere fact of its presence alone isn't really all that bad.
IR is everywhere anyway. Sit in a restaurant with those outdoor radiation heaters and you're being basically bathed in IR; enough IR, in fact, that you can physically feel it on your skin. It's not inherently dangerous, it's the same as any other light. Get enough of it in your eye and it hurts or worse.

EDIT: @OP IR isn't any more (or any less) harmful than any other forms of light, I don't think. I suppose the biggest hazard would be a combination of two things:
1) the IR diode pumping the crystal in a green pointer would be significantly more powerful than the green output
2) It's difficult to see.
Number 1 doesn't make much of a difference in safety, because you don't go pointing lasers into your eyes regardless of the power. Number 2 may or may not be a hazard when your laser is too cold or the batteries are low, whereupon someone may eyeball the barrel while holding down the button in a futile (and really not very clever) attempt to diagnose whatever problem they believe is present.

Another thing is that IR does have different optical characteristics to the green light, in the same way that red light diffracts differently than blue and so on. Therefore at long ranges the IR will diverge more, or even exit the laser at a different angle. But at distances where this makes a difference the power density will be low enough that it, well, doesn't make a difference.

 

[NightExplorer96]

uhuh... recreational. Uh.

I agree though, I don't see how the IR is any more damaging than the green portion. Unless you got a laser that had crappy alignment and put out a very tiny bit of green and mainly IR.
Even then, if you pointed any laser in your eye you wouldn't be a very well informed sort of person.
Really the only trouble I have with IR is that it isn't the 'targeted' output and therefore not desirable, but the mere fact of its presence alone isn't really all that bad.
IR is everywhere anyway. Sit in a restaurant with those outdoor radiation heaters and you're being basically bathed in IR; enough IR, in fact, that you can physically feel it on your skin. It's not inherently dangerous, it's the same as any other light. Get enough of it in your eye and it hurts or worse.

I talk about IR a lot and how damaging it can be but when you get to the just of it.

As long as someone operates a laser in a safe manner and understands the risk, no wavelength is more dangerous then the next. IR is only dangerous to the people who think cheap eBay pens emit only 532nm and are unaware of the 808nm and 1064nm it takes to create 532nm

 

[J0SHUA]

Actaully IR is very hazardous to our health... It encourages extreme laziness by helping us turn on our entertainment advices without getting off the couch and encourages us to stay up all night and get sleep deprivation by making it possible to see outside at night

Oh no my green pen pisses IR so much it burnt the hair off my ass just by looking at the dot. Maybe I should get an IR filter for my ass.

Lmao. There is some ir nazi sitting there reading this thread absolutely tearing out his hair right now.

" these idiots will be blind in two weeks, ahhhhhhhhh!"

I read that farts contain dangerous levels of IR radiation that is focused through the rectum and emitted as an intense pulsed beam. The FDA is looking into mass producing IR protective goggles for people to wear when entering a restroom. I recommend getting a patent for the RIRF (Rectal Infra Red Filter of course) and develop a prototype for recreational bowel use.

I just spent the last 5 mins roflmao :crackup:

 

[Photonz]

uhuh... recreational. Uh.

I agree though, I don't see how the IR is any more damaging than the green portion. Unless you got a laser that had crappy alignment and put out a very tiny bit of green and mainly IR.
Even then, if you pointed any laser in your eye you wouldn't be a very well informed sort of person.
Really the only trouble I have with IR is that it isn't the 'targeted' output and therefore not desirable, but the mere fact of its presence alone isn't really all that bad.
IR is everywhere anyway. Sit in a restaurant with those outdoor radiation heaters and you're being basically bathed in IR; enough IR, in fact, that you can physically feel it on your skin. It's not inherently dangerous, it's the same as any other light. Get enough of it in your eye and it hurts or worse.

Who said bowel use can't be recreational?
Recreational - relating to or denoting activity done for enjoyment when one is not working.

Now don't tell me you don't enjoy evacuating your bowels after a stressful work day

 

[CheeseHasLeafs]

Oh wow I edited my post like three times without realising you guys were posting. Oops haha.

Photonz, I must agree. Evacuating your bowels can be very relaxing, and highly umm.. Cathartic is the word.

 

[Photonz]

Oh wow I edited my post like three times without realising you guys were posting. Oops haha.

Photonz, I must agree. Evacuating your bowels can be very relaxing, and highly umm.. Cathartic is the word.

:crackup: I like the word choice:beer:

 

[Jmillerdoc]

Helicopter Medic Injured in Laser Incident Over Dallas | NBC 5 Dallas-Fort Worth

Another story on this.....

I am calling BS on this flight paramedics story. There are too many details that cannot be overlooked, details that make the paramedics claims sound like he is trying to make some $$$ from some sort of work place injury. First is the mention of pain. We use lasers now to perform retina surgery and the power applied is far more than this goofball could have received yet where is all the complaints of pain in laser retina surgery? The retina does not have nocioreceptors and like injuries to the brain tissue itself, the do no hurt. Remember that the eyeball is an extension of the brain, the retina is considered the most distant extension of brain tissue that's visible foe outside the body. A corneal burn will cause pain, a retina burn will not. Second, the story says they had to divert their flight because of the injury. This means they were cruising at altitude and in general the restrictions on this, especially over a city, dictates the helicopter was at least 1500-2000 ft. This means that the paramedic must have been staring straight down and the beam straight up to have the minimum distance of 1500ft. It's more likely the paramedic was staring out and the beam was at an angle off 90 degrees. At degrees off 90 your looking at more like a minimum of 3000ft or much more. Third, he was looking through at least a 1/4 inch of UV rated Pexiglass that cuts power back even more. Add all this up and it smells of BS. Very unlikely that even with one of our custom high powered builds this guy would end up with a painful corneal burn. Possibly a retinal injury but still quite unlikely, at least not a permanent one. There is a guide somewhere around the forum that shows the relation between distance, power, and wavelength in regards to eye injury. I don't recall the exact numbers but this seems like a distance that would be in the "dazzling" range at 1w or so. I could be off on this and it would be nice if someone could link to what I am referring to. But still, the rest of the details of the story make me think this is all about a workmanship comp or work place injury lawsuit and not a true injury.

I'm not saying shining a laser at a helicopter is smart or somehow isn't dangerous. I'm just saying the story doesn't add up as presented.

My two medical cents....

 

[NightExplorer96]

Helicopter Medic Injured in Laser Incident Over Dallas | NBC 5 Dallas-Fort Worth

Another story on this.....

I am calling BS on this flight paramedics story. There are too many details that cannot be overlooked, details that make the paramedics claims sound like he is trying to make some $$$ from some sort of work place injury. First is the mention of pain. We use lasers now to perform retina surgery and the power applied is far more than this goofball could have received yet where is all the complaints of pain in laser retina surgery? The retina does not have nocioreceptors and like injuries to the brain tissue itself, the do no hurt. Remember that the eyeball is an extension of the brain, the retina is considered the most distant extension of brain tissue that's visible foe outside the body. A corneal burn will cause pain, a retina burn will not. Second, the story says they had to divert their flight because of the injury. This means they were cruising at altitude and in general the restrictions on this, especially over a city, dictates the helicopter was at least 1500-2000 ft. This means that the paramedic must have been staring straight down and the beam straight up to have the minimum distance of 1500ft. It's more likely the paramedic was staring out and the beam was at an angle off 90 degrees. At degrees off 90 your looking at more like a minimum of 3000ft or much more. Third, he was looking through at least a 1/4 inch of UV rated Pexiglass that cuts power back even more. Add all this up and it smells of BS. Very unlikely that even with one of our custom high powered builds this guy would end up with a painful corneal burn. Possibly a retinal injury but still quite unlikely, at least not a permanent one. There is a guide somewhere around the forum that shows the relation between distance, power, and wavelength in regards to eye injury. I don't recall the exact numbers but this seems like a distance that would be in the "dazzling" range at 1w or so. I could be off on this and it would be nice if someone could link to what I am referring to. But still, the rest of the details of the story make me think this is all about a workmanship comp or work place injury lawsuit and not a true injury.

I'm not saying shining a laser at a helicopter is smart or somehow isn't dangerous. I'm just saying the story doesn't add up as presented.

My two medical cents....

If only we didn't have noobs with lasers doing all this

We could be spending more time on lasers, and less time on trying to defend our hobby which dosen't cause any harm to anyone :undecided:

 

[trencheel303]

Defending the hobby is a pointless exercise, no one listens.

All that will happen if they're (laser ownership) criminalised is the hobby will go underground and there will be an explosion of people building their own. Laser parts themselves can't possibly be banned, and the whole prohibition thing is a nightmare to enforce as lasers are inside lots of things nowadays. Banning ownership of handheld lasers would in effect make it perfectly legal to own a CD player etc, but then make it illegal for you to remove the diode and use it as a pointer. The whole thing is just a legal nightmare, some countries are already trying to go down that route.

 

[OrionBLF]

He said they should just make it a crime to have these things...

That incident was unfortunate. But banning's not going to solve it. Like guns, knives and medicine. You can try to moderate and educate. It's about how you use them albeit responsibly. Laserpointers are already prevalent in society and many of its uses are legitimate. So it makes no sense for the media to hype it up and demonise. The authorities are seemingly blurring that thin red line between mischief and terrorism. Would they also feel desperate enough to introduce a buyback scheme with a $50 gift card per hand-held in future? :shhh:

 

[J0SHUA]

Would they also feel desperate enough to introduce a buyback scheme with a $50 gift card per hand-held in future? :shhh:

I swear, if there are more of these incidents, and there will be, there will be a nation wide laser ban that will be ran by this woman here: :crackup: