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UK Pilots' Union Calls For Laser Pointers To Be Classed As Offensive Weapons (theguardian.com)
An anonymous reader writes: The body that represents airline pilots in the UK has called for handheld laser pointers to be classed as offensive weapons, after a Virgin Atlantic flight to the U.S. was forced to return to Heathrow when its co-pilot was dazzled by a laser during takeoff. The British Airline Pilots Association (Balpa) said aircraft were being "attacked" by the devices "at an alarming rate and with lasers with ever-increasing strength." It said the problem was becoming "more and more urgent."
They banned them here in Australia over a decade ago after a number of incidents of people using them against planes. One such incident was my brother, still remember that night as federal police turned up to our property to find the offender that caused a plane to do an emergency aborted landing, while they let him off with a warning my parents certainly didn't.
They don't HAVE to no, but you really don't want your pilots sitting there pressing a couple of buttons and only getting actual hands on feel with the controls during emergencies. You need the pilots to actually interact with the plane regularly to keep them useful for when those things the autopilot actually cannot cope with arise.
I still maintain that if a $5 cat toy
If you think that the lasers being used to do this are $5 cat toys, you are ignorant. It is disingenuous at best to pretend that the problem is $5 cat toys.
then the aircraft itself is deeply flawed
Yeah, because having a large machine operated by a human being who needs eyesight to do it safely is such a flawed concept.
Of course, despite all the whinging, there's never been a documented case of that it actually happening.
You are posting in a discussion about a documented case of it happening.