"Larry Dighera" wrote
It would appear that the press may not be required to do any pushing:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washing...aircraft_x.htm
Posted 1/11/2005 8:21 PM Updated 1/12/2005 2:29 PM

More reports of lasers being shot into airplane cockpits
WASHINGTON (AP) - Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta said
Wednesday there have been 400 reports of lasers being beamed at
airplanes since 1990 and the Federal Aviation Administration will now
require pilots to immediately report such incidents to air traffic
controllers, who will be required to notify law enforcement officials.

Hello? This includes many, many, incidents around Las Vegas. At one time,
there were dozens of high power lasers sweeping the skys. It happend when
relatively cheap and very high powered Nd YAG Lasers became available. It
was a complete zoo and really was a nuisance.

The current stuff is bull****. Pilots can be idiots like anyone else. The
colour of a DPSS (or most any visible) laser is utterly unmistakable. It
looks *weird*. And, throw in a bit of paranoia and you have people seeing
them in their soup. I now feel comfortable blaming every imperfect night
landing on them. The drag is that I now will have to call the police, CSIS,
CIA, DHS, FBI, Army, Navy and NASA every time I'm unhappy with a touchdown.
Idiots.

The lasers can temporarily blind pilots.

Not the 5 mw hand held ones at a range of miles. Idiots.

moo