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If someone is pointing a Laser beam on the cockpit of a small low flying aircraft, what kind of hardware can be deployed near the windshield to deflect it?

Federico
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NitinG
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    Why a small airplane as opposed to a large one? – GdD Aug 08 '16 at 11:24
  • small planes are more prone as they fly low and are more visible than the larger ones.. Larger ones are also prone nut when they are on their descent... – NitinG Aug 08 '16 at 11:26
  • I have to disagree with you @NitinG. Most light airplanes fly high enough that hitting one with a laser would be challenging, all airplanes are most vulnerable to lasers on approach and takeoff as that's when they are lowest and slowest. – GdD Aug 08 '16 at 11:30
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    @Pondlife not really, they are all about static shielding, this question is about "deploying". I mentioned those in my answer because I received comments asking me to address the point. – Federico Aug 08 '16 at 14:25
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    @Federico I see your point, but to me all these questions are simply asking the same thing: how can we prevent laser strikes affecting the pilot/aircraft? – Pondlife Aug 08 '16 at 14:31

2 Answers2

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Laser light is light: if you deflect the laser, you also deflect other light sources, hence you effectively blind the pilot.

You have then achieved the result of reducing the field of vision of the pilot.

EDIT

To address your comment.

but that would be momentarily but the laser beam can actually blind the pilot completely or can create injury. So, i feel may be deflection is a better idea as it will deflect light only for some time..

how? laser travels at the speed of light, what are you trying to achieve? Blocking the light before it reaches the pilot? Blocking it afterwards? (for a pilot to be blinded, a few milliseconds are enough, given a powerful enough laser source)

EDIT 2.0

Since the above seems not to be clear enough, I will try to express this in other words.

No matter the method of your choosing, laser light travels at the speed of light: by the time you detect it, and then block (or reflect, diffuse, selectively filter) it, the pilot might be already blinded.

If your idea involves the use of passive methods (windshield coatings and similar) see here (and here) why they are a bad idea.

Federico
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  • but that would be momentarily but the laser beam can actually blind the pilot completely or can create injury. So, i feel may be deflection is a better idea as it will deflect light only for some time.. – NitinG Aug 08 '16 at 11:03
  • @NitinG see edit – Federico Aug 08 '16 at 11:05
  • It's possible to block some light without blocking all of it. There are filters for specific ranges of frequencies. – Steve Aug 08 '16 at 12:51
  • @Steve yes, but then you need to know the frequency and "deploy" (as the question asks) a different filter for each (or almost) different laser – Federico Aug 08 '16 at 13:14
  • @Federico What about diffusion instead of deflection? – called2voyage Aug 08 '16 at 13:34
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    @called2voyage that's not what the question asked, but the end effect would not change much. You would blur out everything. Technically it is not blinding, but practically would not be much different. – Federico Aug 08 '16 at 13:38
  • @Federico Yes, the asker didn't technically ask that, but the goal is to prevent laser causing negative effects (i.e. blinding) in the cockpit. Active diffusion systems are possible where the diffusion would be concentrated where the laser was hitting the windshield, but the rest of the windshield would be less diffused so everything wasn't blurred out. I don't know if this is technically feasible yet or even if it is desirable (certainly, I'm not sure how one would defend against deliberate attempts to blur out the windshield), but I think it is worth addressing. – called2voyage Aug 08 '16 at 13:43
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As mentioned by others, the issue is that lasers are light. If you block too much light, you can't see out. OTOH, one key feature of lasers are that they operate at specific frequencies, so one solution is a spectral filter that blocks the frequencies used by the most common lasers. (This technology has been around for about 30 years.) Integrating the filters into a windscreen would be very expensive. Using film would likely have certification and maintenance issues, so it's not really practical for a windscreen installation. A better solution is for pilots to wear laser-protective eyewear containing lenses with the appropriate filtering.

Gerry
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