As many here know, I have been working on some high energy pulsed lasers. Each time I come up with some bright idea, I can test the effect spectrally with an attenuated spectrometer. I can test the pulse duration and the RELATIVE power with a biased photo diode sent to an oscilloscope. The problem is determining the absolute energy in a single pulse.
I built a calorimeter based on a small aluminum light trap supported in a vacuum. It sounds like it might work, but the range of measurement is limited to how fine a temperature differential I can measure and when I get really serious the trap gets hot and has to cool prior to the next reading. This means dumping the vacuum and so on.
So... I was trying a new converter dye and decided to see if the beam got any warmer than it was before. I mean how good could it be? So, I used my hand. Yep, that's what I did and the converter was good, really really good. Despite my cat like reflexes I didn't manage to pull my hand out in time. An entire civilization disappeared in some nearby universe between the pulse and my awareness of the pulse. There was a loud snap and the plume was bright because the laser goggles don't protect you from a broad-band black body. It may have actually damaged the surface of the output coupler as the acetone and the methanol along with the optical wipes are not removing the splatter. I could use some suggestions here.
Anyway, and the hand? Well, there is a nice 3cm (exactly 3.0cm diameter grey circle covering a blister. And boy does it hurt. This is serious stuff. You would not want to trust goggles to a direct hit from this thing. I don't know what kind of power it is outputting, but the Cynosure V beam I used to operate would do this kind of damage ( maybe a bit less, I can't remember for sure, but this really hurts) at around 10J/cm^2.
This is a little like getting a speeding ticket in a Ferrari. It hurts, but I can't help smile a little. At least the ticket says how fast you were going. Oh well.