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US: Military says Soviet ship aimed laser at US aircraft; injuring pilot's eyes

A Soviet naval vessel used to monitor Soviet missile tests “apparently” aimed a laser beam at two U.S. aircraft, causing temporary blindness to a pilot.

The incident happened September 30 or October 1, 1987. According to an October 2 1987 Pentagon statement, a U.S. Navy P-3 reconnaissance aircraft was “illuminated by an intense light” from the Soviet ship Chukotka. An Air Force WC-135 intelligence plane also was illuminated.

The statement said the light “disturbed” the vision of the co-pilot, and “although preliminary medical evaluation has shown no apparent damage, further detailed tests may be required to determine if, in fact, no damage to her eyes occurred.”

Sen. Malcolm Wallop (R-Wy) initially disclosed the incident. He said “In my opinion, anything that disturbs your vision for 10 minutes damages your vision. The effect was to temporarily blind that co-pilot."

According to the Pentagon, they believe the light source was a laser. The Pentagon statement did not speculate on the reason for the illumination of the aircraft.

The New York Times referenced one official who said the Soviet ship might have tried to harass or blind the pilots, while a naval consultant said it could be that the laser was used to track missiles and was inadvertently shined at the U.S. aircraft.

Such illumination had occurred before, according to the Pentagon statement.

The 1987 edition of a Pentagon publication, Soviet Military Power, said that "recent Soviet irradiation of Free World manned surveillance aircraft and ships could have caused serious eye damage to observers." The following picture and caption appeared on page 113 in the book:

Soviet laser on ship 1987


From the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times

Russia: Commercial aircraft hit in two separate laser incidents

Two commercial airliners were illuminated by laser beams as they flew over Russia in two separate incidents on May 31 2014.

The crew of a Transaero Boeing 777-200 flying from Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport to the Egyptian resort of Hurghada alerted air traffic controllers that someone in Maykop, in the Russian republic of Adygea (in Krasnodar) was shining a laser into the cockpit. "The unidentified person tried to blind the Transareo pilots for 20 seconds as they few over Maykop at 10:12 p.m. at an altitude of 11,000 meters," an official at the air traffic control center told Interfax.

The flight was not disrupted and continued to its destination.

In the second incident, someone aimed a green laser beam into the cockpit of UTair ATR-72 turboprop as it approached the Nizhny Novgorod airport to land at 10:55 p.m.. The plane, which had taken off from Moscow's Vnukovo Airport, safely landed.

It was no immediately clear how many passengers were on the two flights. But depending on the cabin configurations, the 777-200 can carry 300 to 440 passengers and the ATR-72 carries 68 to 74 passengers.

Pilots have regularly complained about being targeted by laser pointers in Russia over the past year. No accidents have occurred, but the State Duma has approved in a first reading a bill that would toughen penalties for people convicted of pointing lasers at planes. Currently, offenders face a small fine.

From the Moscow Times

Russia: 757 airliner hit by green laser on landing in Siberian city

The pilots of a Boeing 757 were temporarily blinded by a green laser beam as they were descending towards an airport in Omsk, in southwestern Siberia. The aircraft had 226 passengers and 8 crew members. The beam appeared to come from a central street in Omsk, Russia’s seventh largest city by population. The plane landed safely with no injuries, and no disruption to airport operations.

From the Moscow Times

Ukraine: Video shows Russian soldier aiming laser at recon plane

A video released by Ukraine's press service shows a Russian soldier aiming a green laser at a Ukranian DA42 light surveillance plane. This was apparently done either for determining range, or to dazzle the pilots or the surveillance camera.

The propeller plane was patrolling the northern part of Crimea when it was fired upon during daylight hours.

Ukraine recon plane Russian soldier laser 300w
A still frame from the video, showing the soldier outside a tent



From The Aviationist

Russia: Laser aimed at passenger jet landing at Moscow airport

A laser beam was aimed at a passenger jet as it was preparing to land on August 28 2013, according to the Russian Interior Ministry’s transport department.

The pilot of the Tupolev Tu-204 jet, bound from the city of Krasnodar in south Russia to Moscow, said he was blinded by the beam as the plane was approaching Vnukovo Airport. The plane landed normally; all 220 passengers and 8 crew were unhurt. An investigation is underway.

A similar illumination occurred on August 24 2013, to an airplane on approach to Pulkovo-1 airport in St. Petersburg, according to a UPI report.
Click to read more...

Russia: String of recent laser pointer hits on aircraft

The pilots of two airliners reported attempts to blind them with laser pointers near Moscow’s Vnukovo airport on August 20 2013, according to Russian transport police.

The first incident occurred shortly after midnight, when a laser pointer beam hit the cockpit of an Astana-bound airliner. The second took place less than an hour later, targeting a Moscow-London flight shortly after take-off, the Interior Ministry’s Transport Department said in a statement. “No one was harmed in either incident,” the department said.

The incidents are the latest in a string of similar attacks, with transport police reporting at least five aircraft being targeted by laser pointers in Moscow and St. Petersburg in the previous week alone.

After a series of incidents involving lasers near airports in 2011, the lower house of Russia’s parliament, a bill was introduced in the State Duma to punish violators with jail terms of up to seven years in prison. The Duma plans to look again at the bill in the fall 2013 session.

From RIA Novosti. See also this August 13 2013 story from Pravda, “Laser attacks against aircraft in Russia continue”

Russia: Laser flashblinds 737 crew landing in Krasnodar

A laser flashblinded the crew of a Boeing 737 carrying 89 passengers, as it landed in the southern Russian city of Krasnodar on November 21 2011. No injuries were reported. Although police “identified the spot where the attack came from”, no one has been arrested.

From The Moscow Times
.

Russia: Aeroflot pilot "barely averted" a crash due to teen aiming laser pointer

The pilot of an Airbus 320 with 128 people on board said he “barely averted a crash” after a laser beam “remained in the cockpit almost until the plane touched down”. The laser attack occurred at 5:49 a.m. local time September 22 2011 in Barnaul, capital of the Russian federal district Altai Krai, in Siberia. The laser was wielded by a 15-year-old boy who could not sleep and aimed a pointer out his window.

The boy told police that he “had not planned to blind the pilot and had only directed the beam at the flashing lights of the airplane.” Police said his parents would be fined 500 rubles (USD $15) for negligence.

The deputy chief of police at the Barnaul airport, Andrey Spiridonov, said that tragedy was avoided by a miracle.

Pic 2011-09-25 at 2.34.43 PM
The laser pointer being displayed by police; the boy’s apartment building, mother and bedroom window. Larger versions are in a
photo gallery at Altapress.ru.

Pic 2011-09-25 at 3.00.54 PM
Barnaul, Altai Krai federation, Siberia

Pic 2011-09-25 at 3.41.08 PM
It is about 4.5 miles from Barnaul Airport (red marker) to the boy’s apartment building (green marker) at 35 Sunny Glades. Click on map for a larger image.

Analysis, news links and additional details are after the jump (click “Read More…” below).

Click to read more...

US: DOD confirms eye injury to copter passenger; perhaps from Russian vessel Kapitan Man?

On April 4 1997, an American naval officer onboard a Canadian military helicopter suffered eye pain and injuries that “would be expected from exposure to a low level laser, such as a laser range-finder”. The pain came after a patrol photographing merchant vessels in the Strait of Juan de Fuca near Seattle, including the Russian ship M/V Kapitan Man.

Coast Guard and Navy personnel boarded the vessel on April 7 but were unable to find any laser device, or evidence of a possible device. U.S. Navy Lt. Cmdr. Jack Daly was then examined by military laser eye injury experts, who found “there was a high probability that the minor burns on the lieutenant's right retina were caused by multiple laser exposures such as might result from a single glimpse at a repetitive pulsed laser.”

1997-KapitanMan
The American naval officer took this photo in the Strait of Juan de Fuca showing a red light on the M/V Kapitan Man. The light led some to suspect a laser. However, subsequent inspection did not find a laser, and in the location of the red light were “two deep red running lights … that met the guidelines established for sidelights.”


The U.S. Defense Department concluded that “[a]vailable evidence does not indicate…what the source of such an exposure might have been. Specifically, there is no physical evidence tying the eye injury of the American officer to a laser located on the Russian merchant vessel.”

The Strait of Juan de Fuca laser incident was also discussed in the August 2004 medical journal Archives of Ophthalmology. The article “Assessment of Alleged Retinal Laser Injuries” describes “Case 5” and concludes that “…[n]o evidence of laser injury was found in the years after the incident by 17 other ophthalmologists, including 5 neuro-ophthalmalogists and 8 retina specialists. A trial was held 5 years after the incident in which the retina specialist who made the initial diagnosis steadfastly maintained all the photographer’s [naval officer’s] symptoms were due to retinal laser injury. A jury ruled against the photographer’s claim for damages against the ship’s owner.… The patient had real complaints, but they were caused by preexisting autoimmune problems rather than by laser injury.”

The full text of the DOD press release, and the “Case 5” study is below (click the “Read More…” link). Additional information above is from a 2011 Washington Times story.

Click to read more...

Russia: Laser beam shines on Moscow airplane

Moscow police are searching for the person who aimed a laser beam at an aircraft landing at Domodedovo Airport on July 25 2010. Three incidents also happened at the same airport in June, according to authorities.

In a related story, Russia Today has posted a video showing what it looks like to be in an aircraft during a laser illumination:


Frame showing point of maximum dazzle when a laser beam hits the aircraft’s cockpit window. Click to see the
YouTube video.

From UPI, and from Russia Today via YouTube

UPDATE July 28 2011: Bloomberg quotes news agency RIA Novosti as saying a suspect was caught on July 27. The 26-year-old told police “he couldn’t even imagine that his actions could cause a plane to crash.” The news agency says the suspect was 40 kilometers from the airport on Kosygin (Kosygina) Street in western Moscow.


The map shows the suspect’s location (A) in relation to Domodedovo Airport (B)

Russia: Some Rostov-on-Don laser attacks due to insurgents? (UPDATE: Maybe not...)

In five June incidents, pilots were temporarily blinded in the city of Rostov-on-Don. Incidents occurred on approach to the Rostov-on-Don airport on June 3, June 7 and twice within an hour on June 23. In addition, the pilot of a police helicopter was blinded in mid-June. German news agency DPA reported that “insurgents in the Caucasus region were responsible” for these laser attacks.Click to read more...

Russia: Two incidents in one week

Russian air transport regulator Rosaviatsiya noted an increase this year in cases of pilots being blinded by laser pens during landing at Russian airports, with 30 such incidents registered as of June 8 2011. Only five cases were registered in 2010.

On June 8, a pilot was blinded by a laser pointer while landing a Boeing passenger plane in the southern city of Rostov-on-Don, but managed to land safely. The beam came from the area of a local market.

Earlier in the week a pilot of an Airbus A320 plane was blinded by a laser light during landing at the same airport

From RIA Novosti