The case might have seemed to be innocuous, but the testimony given by two Air Malta pilots in the case instituted against an amateur astronomer was chilling. The two pilots said that when a laser beam hit their cockpit, one was left with temporary blind spots and the other was trying to land a plane with the equivalent of a fluorescent search light blinding him.
The case is still in court, with the accused saying he was pointing out planets with a laser pen. In court, a lawyer argued that footballer Lionel Messi recently had 10 lasers pointed at him during a football match, but still managed to score. But what he didn’t count on was the darkness effect. Pilots turn off their cockpit lights for landing, and what might look like a spot from a few metres away actually turns into a blinding light up in the sky.
Studies show that pointing a laser beam at the cockpit of a landing aircraft can have very serious consequences. The same studies show that, while a laser pointer beam may look harmless from the ground, it could be deadly for a tired airline pilot coming in to land at night.
The captain, of the Air Malta flight, who was not at the controls at the time, said the plane was approaching the airport from Mellieha, and he saw a green light. This occurred for some five times during the landing. At one point he happened to be looking directly at the laser beam and his vision was impaired by a dark spot for around 10 minutes. The jet was flying at 2,500 feet and lower.
The First Officer said that at one point the cockpit “lit up” with green light. “The effect was like that of a searchlight,” he said.
Even though the landing was not affected, both pilots felt that the incident could have had more serious consequences.
Similar cases have occurred all over the world in the past few years, with some serious near misses. In July 2011, a laser pointer temporarily blinded a JFK inbound JetBlue pilot. Two months later a Russian Aeroflot jet with 128 people onboard “almost crashed” after the pilots were blinded by a laser beam pointed by a 15-year-old boy.
Also, according to reports, the pilot of the Asiana Airlines crash in Los Angeles earlier this year, which left two people dead, reported being blinded by a strong light source, possibly a laser beam.
Last March, a California court sentenced a man to 30 months in jail after he was found guilty of pointing a laser pointer at an airliner during landing and also at a police helicopter. The court sentence was considered to be “a strong message that such acts are not to be considered as fun and games.”
We are not suggesting that one person be made a scapegoat, but something really needs to be done about the situation. When the story first made the news, the severity of it did not really register. It is only now, after further investigation, that the potential consequences sink in. As mere mortals, we ask whether anything can be done, on a technical level, to shield the glare – a protective coating on glass, for example. In the meantime, the message needs to get out. These things are dangerous – hundreds of people’s lives are at stake.