Amazon Sold Eclipse Glasses That Cause 'Permanent Blindness,' Alleges Lawsuit (arstechnica.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: A South Carolina couple claims in a proposed federal class-action lawsuit (PDF) that Amazon sold defective eclipse-watching glasses that partially blinded them during the historic coast-to-coast solar eclipse on August 21. Corey Payne and fiance Kayla Harris say in their lawsuit that because of the eyewear Payne purchased from Amazon, the couple is now suffering from "blurriness, a central blind spot, increased sensitivity, changes in perception of color, and distorted vision." Amazon issued a recall of defective and perhaps counterfeit eclipse eyewear in an e-mail sent out to customers before the event. Payne said he did not receive the message. His suit seeks to represent others who were injured or may be injured from the eyewear purchased on Amazon. The alleged Tennessee-based maker of the glasses, American Paper Optics, is not named in the suit. The suit seeks funds "for medical monitoring" because "Plaintiffs and members of the proposed class have or will experience varying degrees of eye injury ranging from temporary discomfort to permanent blindness." The suit also demands unspecified monetary damages, punitive damages, and legal fees and costs.

Comments

Stupidity

[MightyMartian]

I remember back in the day being told that it wasn't safe to look at the sun even with heavily filtered/polarized glasses during an eclipse. Not even welding masks or goggles were safe, and the only safe way to look at an eclipse was via an indirect method like a pinhole projector. Even now I see the warnings suggest that even with "proper" viewing glasses, you really shouldn't expose yourself for more than a few minutes.

Re:Stupidity

[cdsparrow]

Big news here: staring at a huge unshielded nuclear reaction may be harmful to eyesight! I'm aghast!

Seriously though, put the glasses on and look at the sun before the eclipse, if it hurts your eyes doing that, guess what, it'll hurt when you look at the eclipse. This isn't rocket science... These people probably bought the glasses specifically so they could sue afterword, lol.

Re:Stupidity

[msauve]

I'm gonna go with NASA and AAS over an AC with no references on this one:

Experts suggests that one widely available filter for safe solar viewing is welders glass of sufficiently high number. The only ones that are safe for direct viewing of the Sun with your eyes are those of Shade 12 or higher.

- NASA AAS

Myself, I used a Thousand Oaks SolarView filter on a C8.

Re:Stupidity

[ayesnymous]

The AAS says as long as your glasses are certified ISO 12312-2 (adopted in 2015), you can wear them indefinitely (that's a lot longer than 3 minutes at a time):

https://eclipse.aas.org/eye-sa...

You can wear welding masks as long as they are shade 14:

https://eclipse2017.nasa.gov/s...

Re:Aren't they an ops company?

[known_coward_69]

Lately almost everything sold on amazon is sold by third party and amazon just does warehouse, shipping and billing. a lot of stuff is shipped by the third party as well.

they try to play the game like a common carrier but it won't last for long

Suing Amazon because of their Deep Pockets!

[oldgraybeard]

They should really be suing the Retailer with the Amazon store, but where is the huge pay out there ;)
It will be interesting to see how this turns out! Amazon has a boat load of cash to pay out, but they also could use that boat load of cash to hire armies of the best lawyers in the country.

My take, the "Scum Sucking" lawyers doing this will not win the Law Suit Lottery!!!

Re:Partial Solar eclipse frankly boring...

[chihowa]

The shadows through the leaves are pretty damn cool.