Whoa! Look at this photo of Egyptian protesters using laser pointers on a military helicopter:

[Are_grits_groceries]

@AFP

That's a new one.

[HiPointDem]

1. just curious -- could that conceivably disable the helicopter? thinking about lasers on

electronics.

i know nothing about electronics, just curious.

[NutmegYankee]

2. No. but it can blind the pilot.

It can cause permanent eye damage.

[MattSh]

3. If the laser is strong enough...

They're much more likely to blind those around them then someone in a helicopter. A high powered laser is nothing to fool around with and are generally restricted just about everywhere. My guess is that even given conditions in Egypt, there are not that many high powered lasers available on the open market. Besides, the pilot likely has night vision goggles which likely (my guess) would give some protection against lasers and such.

More info here... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_safety

[arely staircase]

5. why would the pilot be wearing night vision goggles? nt

[JHB]

22. Because he's flying low at night?

It helps avoid famous last words like "Crap, I thought that radio tower was farther to the left".

[arely staircase]

23. in a well lit urban ara in which towers are on their charts

I used to fly small airplanes at night and I have never even seen a pair of NVGs. maybe it is different for chopper pilots. Is the local news chopper pilot wearing Night Vision when he's covering a wreck or police chase? I know your friendly American Airlines pilot isn't.

[AtheistCrusader]

25. They would most certainly be using NVG's.

Co-pilot will probably be spotting with FLIR too.

(For all we know, the helicopter pilots love it)

[MADem]

7. That happened to a US Navy pilot on a mil-to-mil w/the Canadians.

It was a laser off a Russian trawler.

[Jerry442]

8. Agreed.

Based on the amount of light being reflected from the fuselage and the rotor blades, I'd guess the cockpit was lit up pretty well, not the best conditions for flying low at night.

[arely staircase]

12. so maybe flying away from the area would be the best thing for them to do nt

[Xithras]

13. A civilian laser cannot harm a military helicopter pilot. Even a lot of them.

LIF's (light interference filters) are fairly standard on military helicopters nowadays. The moment the first laser hit his helicopter, you can be 99.9% sure that the very first thing the pilot did was activate his night vision system to use his LIF. Those filters are designed to protect the pilot against high powered military grade lasers, so you can bet that the civilian cheapies designed for whiteboard use aren't even going to phase it.

[backscatter712]

16. Certainly, a $5 keychain laser won't do the job.

A 1 watt blue laser, which is shipped with safety goggles, strongly worded warnings, and enough laser power to pop balloons, light cigarettes and fry retinas could be another matter.

Though you're right - that military chopper may be prepared for that sort of thing.

[Xithras]

17. A $1000 laser capable of setting paper on fire won't do the job.

LIF's are designed to deal with that. If it were that easy to disable a military helicopter, every soldier in the military would carry a high powered laser as a standard part of their kit, or we would have seen a proliferation of high power laser based anti-aircraft systems decades ago. Those systems don't exist in the field primarily because laser attacks are stupidly easy to defend against. If you know the wavelengths of the incoming lasers (and cheap or powerful, all civilian lasers fall into two specific wavelength bands), filtering their light is trivially easy...even when they have a lot of power behind them.

[backscatter712]

14. I think that's what the protesters were trying to do...

Though you're going to need something stronger than a $5 keychain laser pointer to do the job.

Maybe something like this...

http://www.wickedlasers.com/arctic

[hobbit709]

4. Too many pointers at once could confuse the targeting systems.

[Fire Walk With Me]

6. Protesters seek to oust the dictator Mursi; this protest is their demand he step down. Much is going

on I doubt you'll find on mainstream media. Mursi moved the army into position in several cities a couple of days ago to prepare to smash this opposition.


AJELive ‏@AJELive

BREAKING: Protesters storm Muslim Brotherhood headquarters in Moqattam near #Cairo, #Egypt. More soon http://aje.me/17wFlXu
(Muslim Brotherhood is Mursi's)


Anonymous Operations ‏@Anon_Central

#Egypt-ian protesters occupy the burnt headquarters of the Muslim Brotherhood in Cairo | #July1 #Tahrir
pic.twitter.com/87VxOYkPEv via @57UN



Rapinder ‏@RoadrunnerA

US Marines on stand-by to enter Egypt http://security.blogs.cnn.com/2013/06/28/out-of-precaution-marines-on-ready-to-go-to-egypt-to-protect-u-s-embassy-citizens/ … There are already three US warships in Red Sea that have 2000 marines aboard.

[ashling]

9. So they're trying to get it to crash down into the middle of the crowd?

[stevenleser]

11. Yes, its a pretty thoughtless thing to do. If you shine a laser at an aircraft in the US...

Be prepared to spend over a year in prison

http://idealab.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/09/heres-an-item-for-the.php

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-21939795

[Savannahmann]

21. How much more damage would the helicopter do?

Firing into the crowd? It wasn't there to join the demonstration, it was there to intimidate, and potentially break up the demonstration. It doesn't carry harmless noisemakers. It carries a cannon, missiles, rockets, and who knows what other kind of ordinance. If it is left to fly away, then it can come back in a couple hours doing it all over again.

Worst case scenario, the helicopter crashes into the crowd by you firing laser. Worse case scenario of doing nothing? Helicopter fires targeted and aimed weapons into the crowd. Rearms, and returns later doing the firing into the crowd all over again. Which would have the worst outcome? Who knows. I'd say the aimed firing of weapons, but that's my uneducated opinion.

[stevenleser]

10. Pretty recklessly dangerous thing to do. Even if you dont care about the pilots. Those on the ground

who might be in the way of that helicopter when it crashes don't deserve this.

[HappyMe]

19. I was just thinking the same thing.

If the lasers mess up the pilot's eyes or something on board, wouldn't the helicopter just crash into the protestors or hit a high rise apartment building?

[Xithras]

15. The most disturbing thing about this photo to me...

Those protesters are out there peacefully protesting to try and fend off right wing rule in their home country, and their government is trying to intimidate those peaceful protesters using American military equipment. The silhouette of an Apache is fairly recognizable, and we've sold a bunch of them to the Egyptian government recently.

[AtheistCrusader]

26. I thought that's what it was.

Yeah, zero chance those lasers are doing anything at all to it.

[Apophis]

18. Look at that: there are countries where people go protest if their governments do them wrong.

[Poll_Blind]

20. Flowers on Cyberpunk's grave. Hardcore Nowpunk. Bring your goggles for real. nt

PB

[DeSwiss]

24. K&R

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1017129141