Lasers Close Flight Path

reply to post by GradyPhilpott

Uhhhh... nnnnnooooo... Modern lasers as demonstrated in these attacks are a new form of weapon. They are therefore protected. The Constitution doesn't say "right to keep and bear explosive projectile based arms." The fascist mantra of, "But the founders didn't consider..." is BS. They knew exactly what they were doing. Fundamentally there is no difference here between someone firing a laser at a plane and someone firing a bullet. None.

How is a laser a weapon, when it's a laser pointer? Aside from blinding someone, it cause NO harm to anyone. It's not like it burns through your skin, or is dangerous, EXCEPT for the eyes.

Originally posted by GradyPhilpott
I don't know about Australian constitutional law, but I would guess that if your right to keep and bear arms is non-existent, then your lasers are in trouble.

After the Port Arthur massacre, the government took away the rights to own any pump-action, semi-automatic and automatic weapons. Most law abiding citizens can not only own bolt-action weapons. (There are some exceptions, of course).

I would definitely support a ban on laser pointers and putting serious punishments in place for owning one and death for directing one toward an aircraft.

It's good to see that you're not over reacting with a knee-jerk response there. Sure, let's kill every 17 year old punk that points a laser at a plane. That will solve the problem. Next, we can start killing the people who point nuclear missiles at cities. That will take out many of our politicians and high-ranking military officials (probably not such a bad thing at all). We won't stop there either, we'll kill everyone who points a syringe filled with blood at another person. Wow, your logic solves so many problems.

reply to post by Zaphod58

I think you just answered your own question.

Originally posted by tezzajw
Wow, your logic solves so many problems.

At least, I had the wherewithal to offer a solution.

Where's yours?

If that's the case, then ANYTHING could be used as a weapon, and protected under the right to bear arms. This popsicle stick could be sharpened and used as a weapon, and probably hurt someone worse than that laser pointer would. A beer bottle would be too, you break it and stick it in someone and you can kill them. Those are arms too according to that definition.

Yes indeed. Gonna ban popsicle sticks and beer bottles, too? Prohibition is simply not the way to solve a problem.

A popsicle stick or beer bottle isn't going to kill 400 people when a plane crashes. SLIGHT difference there.

Box cutters took out over 3000.

Originally posted by GradyPhilpott
At least, I had the wherewithal to offer a solution.
Where's yours?

Yes, you did offer a 'solution' of sorts. Ending someone's life for pointing a laser at a plane would probably be acceptable to a fair percentage of the population.

My solution is to firstly make the public aware of the risks and dangers in doing so. An educated public is not an ignorant public.

Secondly, airplane windscreens can be modified in future to reduce the effect of the laser. Perhaps being tinted against the laser, or maybe polarised to scatter the laser. The military are researching the best ways to protect their jets from laser fire.

You might not like my solution, as I'm not killing anyone.

reply to post by tezzajw


I don't mind your solution, but does it work?

Will it save lives?

Why should the airline industry, private pilots and the military have to incur these costs so idiots can endanger the lives of hundreds?

How about this for education?

Point a laser at an airplane and if you're caught you'll be sentenced to death and the guy who turns you in, earns $10,000.

[edit on 2008/3/29 by GradyPhilpott]

Seriously, both of our solutions are over-simplistic.

You want to kill as a penalty and I'm assuming that education will work.

There will never be a solution to the CAUSE of the problem.

Imagine one group of people who point lasers at planes are mischievious teenagers. You want to end their lives. I want to try and educate them so they might think twice before they do it. However, risk-taking behaviour is prevalent in ALL teenagers to some degree. No amount of prevention or education will eliminate all rebellious, risk taking behaviour. It's a problem that is endemic across all society, not just pointing lasers at planes.

Imagine another group pf people, say older, social anarchists, who point lasers at planes for 'fun'. Until caught, they'll still do it, if they choose to. Killing them won't always prevent the next person from doing it.

Fixing the windscreens of planes will not 'solve' the problem of lasers being pointed at them, but it will help to neutralise the effect. Solving the problem means tackling deeper social issues about WHY people want to shoot a laser at a plane in the first instance.

This just proves the retards of the world are spoiling it for everyone else. I (and many other amateur astronomers) find laser pointers to be invaluable for lining up a telescope to track satellites and orbiting objects like spent booster shells before getting a fine tune "lock" on the autostar (tracks it automaticly).) Between all the artificial light pollution and now this, I and a lot of other astronomers are going to be mightly pissed if they take these away.

I say arm all planes with laser seeking missles. That should do it!


[edit on 29-3-2008 by ATS4dummies]

Could any commercial pilots here please correct me on these:

1. Don't most planes land with their noses pointing UP, thus minimizing the effect of a ground-based laser "incident"?

2. Don't most commercial flights land automatically, or under instrument guidance / IFR? IOW, you don't actually have to see to land...

3. Would wearing polarized glasses block all but a direct-on or weapons-grade laser attack?

Anyway, shining anything at an aircraft is recklessly stupid. I don't think that banning things or enacting more federal laws are the answer, but what option is there to handle people with zero respect or common sense?

1. You don't flare and put the nose up until just before touchdown. The rest of the approach is flown in a slight nose down attitude to descend.

2. ILS and other landing aids are just that, AIDS. The pilot still has to look out the aircraft and visually make the landing. You have to verify that you are lined up on the runway, there are no obstructions on the runway, etc.

3. I don't know if polarized glasses would help or not, but at night they might make things harder, and night seems to be when most of these are happening.

Not a commercial pilot, but flew when I was younger.

Originally posted by tezzajw
Ok, fine. Use your same argument for guns. They're also toys, so are we allowed to take them away or not?


LOL Guns are toys? I didn't see them in toys R us yesterday.
That argument dosen't really hold up to much since guns were invented for the purpose of killing.

It's called responsibility, and obviously these people don't have it.

Originally posted by tezzajw
Ok, fine. Use your same argument for guns. They're also toys, so are we allowed to take them away or not?

A few people mis-use lasers, so does that give the GOVERNMENT the right to ban them for all users? I don't think so.

I'd love to see guns taken away too.

If both are going to be dangers to the safety of others, get rid of them.

[edit on 29/3/08 by Duality]

Originally posted by Duality
If both are going to be dangers to the safety of others, get rid of them.

Besides being protected by the 2nd Amendment, guns save lives. All the research over the last two decades confirm that.

Read James Wright and Dave Kopel for peer reviewed statistics, if you're interested.

i remember there being a rash of this happening around 2001-2002 at newark in nj and i think jfk,then it just stopped, it always seemed kinda weird to me.

but anywho...... Are handheld laser pointers really powerful enough to shine that far?????? Its gotta be some distance..
Never used one just curious

Originally posted by Duality
I'd love to see guns taken away too.

If both are going to be dangers to the safety of others, get rid of them.

So our list of officially banned items now includes:
laser pointers
guns
sharpened ice-cream sticks

Can we include knives (all forms including kitchen), sharp pencils, fireworks, axes, shovels and spades, chainsaws, drills, petrol and matches?

All of these items can cause injury or be used as murder weapons...

Banning items does not solve the problem. Perhaps we should issue everyone with a safety bubble to live their lives in?