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Got laser pointer?
- Thread starter Abraham Gubler
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What a brave new world urban operations are going to be. I can tell you from experience that getting even eye safe laser energy through your night vision systems (image intensifying type) is not fun at all. It is equally un-fun getting it with the naked eye. Volley fire will only make it worse. I have a picture of an Mi-8 awash in laser light from Cairo a couple nights ago.
Laser pointers will become proper kit for the professional anarchist now. If it isn't already.
Laser pointers will become proper kit for the professional anarchist now. If it isn't already.
yasotay said:
"Eye safe laser energy" is for wishy-washy dilatants. If you're serious about chaos, you need one of these:
Your average laser pointer is 5 milliwatts or less. This thing is 1.4 *watts.*
http://www.wickedlasers.com/arctic
At the same event (probably even the same helicopter):
GTX said:
Same event, perhaps, but not the same helicopter. First one was an AH-64; this one is a Mil, I think.
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This shows why laser weapons would be a game changing technology an infantry soldier could shoot down a helicopter or fighter plane with the mark one eyeball (principle behind the RBS 70 with a missile for the endgame obviously)
Orionblamblam said:
True. the lasers blinded me...
Do the laser pointers cause mayhem for military helicopters and pilots? Or do they have some defense against laser pointers?
Jemiba said:
Entertainment. Too powerful for "laser pointer" uses, too weak for industrial cutting. Apart from "messin' 'round" the only real practical use I can think of for it is defensive. It's excessive as a aiming device for your average rifle... but imagine the effect of lighting that thing up on a burglar. He gets frisky, you write your name on his forehead and retinas with it.
Alternative idea: mount it to a paintball gun. Load with paintballs that are filled not with paint, but carbon black and napalm. Splat the badguy a couple times, then light him up with the laser. Wacky fun!
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Lets add homemade AAA to the mix.
There has been much work on dazzlers for helicopters to make it hard for ground elements to aim at the helicopter. That many laser lights reflecting off the canopy of the helicopter could easily cause disorinatation at night to an aircrew, especially if they were operating in a blacked out city.
There has been much work on dazzlers for helicopters to make it hard for ground elements to aim at the helicopter. That many laser lights reflecting off the canopy of the helicopter could easily cause disorinatation at night to an aircrew, especially if they were operating in a blacked out city.
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sferrin said:
Once upon a time there was a 40mm round for the M203 that was exactly that. When the primer was struck chemicals would mix that would produce a fairly powerful laser pulse. This was intended for blinding EO. IIRC one of the national labs was working on it.
they are generally used for two things. well, three. they are much brighter than a typical laser pointer, so they can be used in less dim conditions, and their dot can be projected much farther away. both make it better for use in larger gatherings, like auditoriums or large conference halls. the green beam is visible to the eye, making it ideal for things like astronomy or other situations where you want to designate a place but don't have a physical surface to work with.Jemiba said:
plus they are just 'cool'.. they are bigger, more impressive looking, and look as expensive as they are, so they can be a status symbol.
in this case, we can add a fourth.. attempting to blind people at a distance.
Kadija_Man said:Obviously "excessive force" isn't a concept in your legal lexicon. :
Oh, sure. If a burglar breaks into your home, shooting him with an RPG or a full-up flamethrower is "excessive force," as these would cause unnecessary collateral damage. But so long as you restrict the weapons effects to the actual target, the concept of "excessive force" doesn't make a whole lot of sense. If you cap a badguy in the noggin with a .22 Short and it kills him, or you blast him with buckshot made out of thermite and burn him to water vapor, carbon dioxide and a fine powdery ash of calcium, potassium and some carbon black, or you flip the switch in the trick walkway and dump him into a tank full of hungry sharks or piranhas... he's still just as dead, either way.
The trick, of course, is to find a system that is both cost effective (argues for .22, against shark tank) and will send an appropriate message that won't be missed.
But back to the laser: A green laser of 5 milliwatts, like the kind I use to entertain my cats, is *almost* bright enough for full sunlight (it's fine in a sunlit room, but hard to see unless you are looking for it outside on a sunny day). A 1+ watt laser would seem to be excessively powerful, not to mention dangerous, as a simple laser pointer, even outdoors. This would be "excessive force" for that application.
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Gentlemen, restraint please. I would like to keep this thread to one regarding the implications of directed energy on air operations. I am quite sure that neither of you is going to persuade the other regardless of what you write.
yasotay said:
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I have my doubts about high power laser pointers becoming a big problem because as they get more dangerous and lethal they start to fall under existing societal and legal response to weapons. Pointing a 1 Watt laser at someone driving on a highway is likely to create the same degree of problem as shooting their car with a .22 rifle yet the latter is still an isolated problem. It’s only by effecting as a nuisance that laser pointers are able to skate under the law and restrictions as weapons. When they become more dangerous they will be treated as such.
The problem area here but is that the laser does not leave behind an easily traceable slug for foresnics. As was the problem with the Juan De Fuca Strait incident when a likely Russian spy ship used a laser on a joint CF/USN recce flight. Despite wounding the aircrew there was no ‘smoking gun’ or bullet damage and traces to the helicopter to prove the attack. On the flipside laser attacks usually leave an easily observable signature as to the source of the attack. Allowing rapid police response. Which in Australia has lead to several successful prosecutions of people trying to laser blind aircraft on approach to landing.
As to the rather ignorant argument about ‘excessive force’ the only problem you would have using an accelerant loaded paintball gun, laser ignited combo as a self-defence weapon (assuming lethal force was an appropriate response to the situation in your jurisdiction) is avoiding prosecution for using a weapon that causes undue pain and suffering and unrecoverable wounding. But all you need to do is successfully argue that it was the only weapon available to use in self-defence. If it wasn’t the only weapon and you chose it over a non-incendiary weapon you would probably lose the reasonable force test.
The problem area here but is that the laser does not leave behind an easily traceable slug for foresnics. As was the problem with the Juan De Fuca Strait incident when a likely Russian spy ship used a laser on a joint CF/USN recce flight. Despite wounding the aircrew there was no ‘smoking gun’ or bullet damage and traces to the helicopter to prove the attack. On the flipside laser attacks usually leave an easily observable signature as to the source of the attack. Allowing rapid police response. Which in Australia has lead to several successful prosecutions of people trying to laser blind aircraft on approach to landing.
As to the rather ignorant argument about ‘excessive force’ the only problem you would have using an accelerant loaded paintball gun, laser ignited combo as a self-defence weapon (assuming lethal force was an appropriate response to the situation in your jurisdiction) is avoiding prosecution for using a weapon that causes undue pain and suffering and unrecoverable wounding. But all you need to do is successfully argue that it was the only weapon available to use in self-defence. If it wasn’t the only weapon and you chose it over a non-incendiary weapon you would probably lose the reasonable force test.
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In the case of the Juan De Fuca strait incident, the Russian vessel was anchored in the strait to monitor the departure of the USS Ohio as she headed out to sea. There is a photograph of what may be the laser firing, but it is not 100% definitive. The reason there was no smoking gun is that the Coast Guard only had two hours to search the ship, they weren't granted access to all of it, and the Clinton Adm instration had warned the Russian government in advance the ship would be searched. It is true that there was little concrete evidence, other than the ambiguous photograph and damage to the aircrews' eyes.
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F-14D said:
Yeah but if the helo had bullet holes in it then they would have had more than two hours to search the ship as it would have been impounded and sailed to port.
Abraham Gubler said:
A few differences:
1) As noted, there is no "ballistics test" for lasers. Nobody can prove if Jimmy Jo Bob Trayvon Habib's laser was the one that blinded a guy or not, while a .22 round can be tested against the weapon.
2) Infinite basically free ammo for a laser.
3) Laser is silent, unlike a .22
4) You can fire a laser in full view of the public and not look like you are firing a laser, unlike a .22
5) No measurable gravity drop or windage, unlike a .22
6) Virtually unlimited range. You could nail the ISS with a laser, unlike a .22.
7) The laser is unregulated. No record that you have one, no law against you having one even if you have an arrest record a mile long.
Fortunately, most of the kind of people who like to physically hurt strangers tend to not be all that smart, so hopefully not many of them will get the idea into their tiny little minds to use lasers to wreak havoc. But never assume that *none* of the crime-minded are capable of innovation.
That's why you make sure it's fatal.
Then enact the S-S-S policy.Many years ago I heard of an incident in, IIRC, NYC where some thug on PCP got hosed down to no effect with Mace, so then they tried zapping him with a taser. Turned out that the chemical mace used was nicely flamable, so the sparks from the taser lit him up.
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Abraham Gubler said:
Not if it was politically inexpedient.
The Kapitan Man was in fact detained and the report said, "...the search of the Kapitan Man revealed no evidence of fixed lasers on the ship". [emphais mine]Besides, by the time all the maneuvering in Washington was done, any gun would be at the bottom of the Sound.
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When I first saw the first photo, my thought was:
"People are celebrating with tracer bullets. What's the occasion?"
I've been to places where firing shots in the air is a proper way to celebrate a wedding, birth of a child, or St. George Day...
"People are celebrating with tracer bullets. What's the occasion?"
I've been to places where firing shots in the air is a proper way to celebrate a wedding, birth of a child, or St. George Day...
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I have to say that I believe the days of cockpit canopy's are coming to an end. With directed energy weapons (light and microwave) likely to show up in the next ten years we are going to have to protect aircrews and passengers from these systems. Perhaps there are means to develop chemical coatings that can preclude this problem, but I suspect flying by sensor will become more prevelent. Just as long as the engineers leave a porthole to see out when the hackers turn off the sensors I think that might be a safe bet. Of course if the hackers turn off the sensors they probably have the means to turn off the whole aircraft.
Not that anyone could take control of a very high end / high technology sensor laden air platform...
Not that anyone could take control of a very high end / high technology sensor laden air platform...
yasotay said:
Interesting what the side effect of that might be. If you didn't have to put windows in a jetliner, you could save considerable weight and cost, while makign the structure stronger and slightly less draggy. Additionally... one of the complaints regarding blended wing body jetliners is the lack of windows for the vast majority of the passengers. If windowless tubes became the norm for jetliner fuselages, then windowless auditoriums would probably be acceptable for BWBs. And without windows, passengers would probably care less how their seats were oriented... and thus the seats could be installed backwards, which is safer for crash protection.
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I fly a fair amount and half of the windows end up with the shade pulled down. I imagine that HD quality video feeds into your pad or the vid-screen in the back of the seat would satisfy most. As the ancient analoge society gives way to the digital, I think that more of the public will be accepting of projected views. An example is that only ten years ago the idea of a touch screen in a combat aircraft was rejected because most of the aircrews desired tactile contact to conduct "business in the office". I understand that F-35 has touch screens and surveys seem to indicate that younger crewmembers are much more accepting of the touch screen idea.Orionblamblam said:
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