Last night on our regional news there was a member of the local air ambulance crew asking some (unknown) sad individuals to desist from shining laser lights at the air ambulance as it tries to land to pick up an emergency patient.

He further said that a week earlier someone had tried to similarly stop a police helicopter landing. That individual had been caught and was now facing prosecution.
But he also said that the aircrew has suffered real eye damage in the incident.

So my question is how could joe average get hold of a laser capable of such damage?

18 minutes ago, studiot said:

So my question is how could joe average get hold of a laser capable of such damage?

The same store that sells the phones and laptops that will disrupt the plane taking off and landing. 

2 hours ago, studiot said:

Last night on our regional news there was a member of the local air ambulance crew asking some (unknown) sad individuals to desist from shining laser lights at the air ambulance as it tries to land to pick up an emergency patient.

He further said that a week earlier someone had tried to similarly stop a police helicopter landing. That individual had been caught and was now facing prosecution.
But he also said that the aircrew has suffered real eye damage in the incident.

So my question is how could joe average get hold of a laser capable of such damage?

Amazon? Or elsewhere online with a simple search.

20 mW or 50 mW green lasers are easily obtained, and there are 1W handheld lasers out there

10 hours ago, swansont said:

Amazon? Or elsewhere online with a simple search.

20 mW or 50 mW green lasers are easily obtained, and there are 1W handheld lasers out there

Thank you for the reply.

I am more familiar with construction lasers which are mostly pretty safe at the distances involved.

Here is some oficial safety information about these.

https://osha.oregon.gov/pubs/newsletters/constructiondepot/OSHAConstructionDepot/archive/2012/08/cd201208-002.html

 

But these are all pretty expensive pieces of kit, el cheapo stuff only reaches a few metres.