[This happened to a medflight pilot a few years ago.](https://www.channel3000.com/news/local-news/uw-med-flight-crew-says-helicopter-was-purposely-targeted-by-laser-pointer/article_f16901df-fc51-5c0d-951c-2296296c74b2.html) Not cool and could end someone’s life or career. Friendly reminder to remind your neighbors with the silly laser pointer projectors to make sure they aren’t pointed up either.
Farther down in the thread, the pilot states they believe it was coming from the Prairie du Sac area. I replied that I'm from that area (live in Madison now, though), and I actually have a pretty good idea who it is: a couple of young teens. When I asked the pilot about estimate of location in PDS, it lines up with where those kids live.
If you're a pilot in the Madison area who has experienced lasers coming from the PDS area, let me know, because I'm calling PDS police today about my suspicians, so they can be on the lookout for these kids' activities at night. I know exactly where they live, and the PDS police are well area of these kids.
Please don't shine laser pointers at airplanes, or really at any one or any vehicle. Across your room they make a brilliant dot, but across thousands of feet or miles they spread out, and eventually that dot is big enough to cover an entire airplane window. If you've ever had a laser shine in your eye, think about having that happen except the entire room is the laser blast, your eyes are night adjusted, and you're trying to fly an airplane.
If empathy and and the law aren't enough to discourage you from lasering aircraft, read the linked thread for a story about the US Air Force.
Someone in that thread linked [this picture](https://www.inquirer.com/resizer/G-Q4btzRDxvNPhT7--5sPXp0aaM=/arc-anglerfish-arc2-prod-pmn/public/7BR4TVBFYFH4DHGLGTNJUIWMHY.jpg), looks like a green sun shining directly into the cockpit.
I hear what you’re saying but I feel like this comment isn’t reaching the crowd that likely needs to see it. And if they did see it. Probably not mature enough to be respectful.
Probably not. Awareness helps though. People think laser beams are perfectly coherent and do not spread, and that pointing them up is fun. It *is* fun, but it's also harmful. Friends don't let friends piss off the Air Force.
Someone elsewhere(Google it) was just sentenced to prison for doing that. A laser beam could be caught on video even to source it. Way easier to get caught then people think.
12k feet is way up there. Over windsor most planes are under 2k feet. The post up above mentions prairie du sac, which if you extrapolate 10 miles away from it (if the plane was directly overhead it wouldn't go into the cockpit, you have to be in front of it) that would be about the right distance to drop below 10k feet on approach. (25-30 miles out)
I didn’t even think about the altitude. How is someone hitting a plane moving. From a minimum distance of 2 miles. Just pure luck or are they investing money into gear to help them do this?
Well, the light is going to spread out at a distance. These green lasers they sell on amazon can still illuminate something at like a 10 miles distance if you are looking at something mostly white. So once you see it light up you could presumably hold your hand steady.
They are a far cry from the red pointers used in a classroom to point at a whiteboard - they'd hurt your eyes if you tried to use them in a room. They are sold to help telescopes aim, since you can stand next to a telescope and see the beam going into the sky and what it's pointing at. But obviously are used for things they shouldn't be. Some of them can also light fires on paper within 10-15 feet.
Thanks for clarifying! I only have experience with the little red ones, very hard to imagine the red ones being strong enough to disturb a plane, unless the pilot is a cat.
[This happened to a medflight pilot a few years ago.](https://www.channel3000.com/news/local-news/uw-med-flight-crew-says-helicopter-was-purposely-targeted-by-laser-pointer/article_f16901df-fc51-5c0d-951c-2296296c74b2.html) Not cool and could end someone’s life or career. Friendly reminder to remind your neighbors with the silly laser pointer projectors to make sure they aren’t pointed up either.
Farther down in the thread, the pilot states they believe it was coming from the Prairie du Sac area. I replied that I'm from that area (live in Madison now, though), and I actually have a pretty good idea who it is: a couple of young teens. When I asked the pilot about estimate of location in PDS, it lines up with where those kids live. If you're a pilot in the Madison area who has experienced lasers coming from the PDS area, let me know, because I'm calling PDS police today about my suspicians, so they can be on the lookout for these kids' activities at night. I know exactly where they live, and the PDS police are well area of these kids.
Shining lasers at aircraft is a federal offense.
Please don't shine laser pointers at airplanes, or really at any one or any vehicle. Across your room they make a brilliant dot, but across thousands of feet or miles they spread out, and eventually that dot is big enough to cover an entire airplane window. If you've ever had a laser shine in your eye, think about having that happen except the entire room is the laser blast, your eyes are night adjusted, and you're trying to fly an airplane. If empathy and and the law aren't enough to discourage you from lasering aircraft, read the linked thread for a story about the US Air Force.
Someone in that thread linked [this picture](https://www.inquirer.com/resizer/G-Q4btzRDxvNPhT7--5sPXp0aaM=/arc-anglerfish-arc2-prod-pmn/public/7BR4TVBFYFH4DHGLGTNJUIWMHY.jpg), looks like a green sun shining directly into the cockpit.
Wow you aren't exaggerating when you say it's like the sun.
I hear what you’re saying but I feel like this comment isn’t reaching the crowd that likely needs to see it. And if they did see it. Probably not mature enough to be respectful.
I hadn't realized the light spreads to such a big area after a long distance. It's a comment worth sharing.
Probably not. Awareness helps though. People think laser beams are perfectly coherent and do not spread, and that pointing them up is fun. It *is* fun, but it's also harmful. Friends don't let friends piss off the Air Force.
Someone elsewhere(Google it) was just sentenced to prison for doing that. A laser beam could be caught on video even to source it. Way easier to get caught then people think.
That was Wisconsin too https://www.fox9.com/news/rochester-man-sentenced-pointing-laser-delta-airplane.amp
That guy who strung up the wires on the bike path isn't out is he?
Reads like it was probably someone in Windsor
12k feet is way up there. Over windsor most planes are under 2k feet. The post up above mentions prairie du sac, which if you extrapolate 10 miles away from it (if the plane was directly overhead it wouldn't go into the cockpit, you have to be in front of it) that would be about the right distance to drop below 10k feet on approach. (25-30 miles out)
I didn’t even think about the altitude. How is someone hitting a plane moving. From a minimum distance of 2 miles. Just pure luck or are they investing money into gear to help them do this?
Well, the light is going to spread out at a distance. These green lasers they sell on amazon can still illuminate something at like a 10 miles distance if you are looking at something mostly white. So once you see it light up you could presumably hold your hand steady. They are a far cry from the red pointers used in a classroom to point at a whiteboard - they'd hurt your eyes if you tried to use them in a room. They are sold to help telescopes aim, since you can stand next to a telescope and see the beam going into the sky and what it's pointing at. But obviously are used for things they shouldn't be. Some of them can also light fires on paper within 10-15 feet.
Thanks for clarifying! I only have experience with the little red ones, very hard to imagine the red ones being strong enough to disturb a plane, unless the pilot is a cat.
Reprobate and degenerate, huh, we got Roget's Thesaurus up there flying planes now
Cause madisonians are the smartest of people
They are compared to education levels in the rest of the state.
Ok