outdoor xmas laser lights

[VelvetThunder]

I was chatting with my buddy last night about all these xmas laser light decorations. Its a simple way to decorate your house in green and red lasers but I'm wondering about the issue of flight paths being hit by the laser bleeding off the house into the sky. I'm near Chicago in the burbs near O'Hare and the flight path for final approach is in my back yard. Near my house the planes are probably no more than 2000-3000 feet in the air. These lasers are probably not more than 5mW is my guess with a diffraction lens to spread out the beams. I'm curious how this compares to getting a laser pen and shooting right at the aircraft when it comes to messing with the pilot's vision. I've heard rumors of some people that live closer to O'Hare having been asked to reposition or remove the lasers by officials. Although they look cool and all, these lasers are almost always bleeding off the houses into the sky.

[slicklasers]

There has been a bunch of reports of pilots calling in those twinkle lasers… example...http://www.wtsp.com/story/news/weird...lane/76094132/

[flecom]

wow sensationalist headline much" Christmas lights almost BRING DOWN coast guard plane... seriously guys? seriously?

[VelvetThunder]

That's kinda what I'm wondering.... those are very low powered and when you are a few thousand feet up in the sky it doesn't seem as though that intensity would be so high as to "Almost bring down a coast guard plane". In that particular story they also pointed out that they weren't being 'tracked' by the laser as with the handheld pointers so it has to be a quick flash at the windscreen of the plane. Maybe the glass diffracts the beams as well into the pilot's eyes, but I would think that it's not that bad since it's so quick and low powered.

It was just a matter of time before they came out with these affordable outside decorations. And it's perfect for people that don't want to fall off a ladder hanging lights, but now every maroooon out there can point one at their house and bleed beams into the sky.

[dream beamz]

I flew in to San Diego 3 nights ago as a passenger on an A330. I could see direct hits from those things from all over the ground. It was a non stop barrage of beams. I am shocked at how bright they appear, I thought it was just more stupid pilots but I truly can see an issue with them.

[VelvetThunder]

Wow, after watching a few vids I am surprised at how bright the simple laser pen is.
This vid was pretty clear https://youtu.be/wej7aPMoz_M

I'm sure now that even these decorative lights are probably pretty distracting without having to track the plane since there are plenty of them on the ground on approach that are bleeding into the sky.

[White-Light]

I think in general with lasers, there's a lot of over exaggeration of the dangers by pilots. There have been claims before that pilots could be blinded by low powered lasers at thousands of feet - highly unlikely. That said, lasers can clearly dazzle during landing and take off's which poses obvious dangers, so these claims aren't without some credit. I could see these lights being a hazard simply because of the sheer number of light sources rather than the power.

Personally, I think the best results come from projection mapping if you can afford the projector and a means of securing it.

[ghosttrain]

I agree with White-Light. Exaggerations. The pilots don't want anything mildly distracting even if it means laws banning something, the legal system doesn't want to end up having permitted something possibly harmful to someone in the future by not explicitly banning it and the media doesn't want to representing everything objectively because it won't generate as many views. And even worse, in my personal opinion some laserists don't mind more strict needless laws costing way more time and money to get permits/licenses/etc which may kill some competition which can't afford it. Nnot implying anyone here, you guys rock, but there are few bad apples everywhere.
You can argue maybe we on the other hand biased ourselves because we don't want our laser toys taken away from us. That's something I can't prove isn't the case, but some actual proof we do have about laser *dangers* (not visibility) at these distances clearly shows otherwise.

Just because the police knocks at your door and then asks you to do something doesn't mean they are ordering you to do so or have the right to it.

In any case I think LEDs or video projection mapping is cooler than lasers for this...