Laser Eye Protection - Antifa

Momentary stray reflections from 40-50 mW and up are enough to blind or damage instantly. Co-worker of mine (when I was in the fiber optic transceiver design business) pulled a live 100 mW IR fiber out of a connector; the beam swept across a metal surface, bounced up into his eye...and boom, blind in that eye. We assembled a 100W blue laser source at work for a program...scariest thing I’ve ever worked on. We had safeties and procedures out the wazoo. No issues, but we were rabid badgers about safety.

So to me this is a big deal. For safety, specific PPE (mil level) will probably be needed. I certainly consider this to be in the grave bodily harm category...anyone in the judiciary/etc who doubts it should be volunteered to stand against a wall, eyes held open, and allow a 5W laser to merely flick across said eyes. No? Then you aren’t allowed to question the response to an IDed individual carrying out such an attack...for an attack it surely is.
*Off topic*
Love your new avatar
BTW, Cool Whip.
 
Could fear of permanent blindness be argued as great bodily harm for your self defense case in the event you choose the 3200 fps option on someone wielding one of those laser pointers?
 
Damn, I’m quite a few years back on the laser market ... especially handhelds. I’m more familiar with metrology use and use in the control of tooling movements where higher power isn’t needed. I know there are industrial uses for high power lasers but what damn reason is there for a $200 1 W handheld laser pointer? Basically it’s a big boy toy with little practical usage ... and I will admit some nonsensical fun uses. It sucks that some idiots have weaponized it ... yes weaponized because it does permanently damage sight ... that screws up another big boy toy.
 
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Could fear of permanent blindness be argued as great bodily harm for your self defense case in the event you choose the 3200 fps option on someone wielding one of those laser pointers?

I plan on it if they try to do me that way.
I figger I get two before the herd scatters
 
So what's mil level PPE for the situation?
Gentex and Teledyne make the ones I have seen.

Several folks have mentioned one of the main issues here: wavelength coverage. Red, green, blue. I’ve seen orange tinted eye pro. Also, a really high powered beam will likely burn through the protection with any significant dwell time (seconds, say, if power is high enough). Older mil lasers did not have the diversity of wavelengths currently available in commercial market laser diodes. Also, ranges were longer in the older mil context.
 
I bleeves that’s why he chose the avatar, to troll :)
I haven’t stirred anything up in a while (except, well, some nanner puddin’), so...

Needed a new avatar anyway. The other one has been around quite a while.
 
Lasers work both ways, you can see where it is coming from. Shoot the dot.
Trouble is, with high power lasers, by the time you see them, you're blind. Here's another view of this incident. Try to locate the source of the lasers. Obviously, these must not be high powered. This incident in Portland and is disturbing on many levels.
 
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Trouble is, with high power lasers, by the time you see them, you're blind. Here's another view of this incident. Try to locate the source of the lasers. Obviously, these must not be high powered. This incident in Portland and is disturbing on many levels.


If you were looking from her direction would be able to see them easily.
 
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Approximately 3300fps...

Yeah look. Pointing a laser at me is playing a stupid game. I have no idea if it’s a weapon aiming device or not. And I will immediately assume it is a weapon mounted aiming device and take appropriate action to prevent my loss of life or serious bodily harm.
 
I just realized a signalling mirror would be handy as a shield and redirects back to the crowd. Might even be able to mount one behind your optic and view through the sighting port. ;)

us-signalling-mirror-5914-a.jpg
 
I just realized a signalling mirror would be handy as a shield and redirects back to the crowd. Might even be able to mount one behind your optic and view through the sighting port. ;)

us-signalling-mirror-5914-a.jpg
Like the idea, but if there are lasers in use the last thing you want is a magnified optic without an appropriate filter.
 
I'm thinking... a parabolic hand held reflector could redirect that laser beam back to the source and make them stop using it.
 
Problem for eye pro from lasers is there are 3 types red, green and blue (and not as likely but somehow some idiot could get a UV or IR one) which function at different wavelengths. The red is typically about 640-650 nm, the green is typically about 530-540 nM and blue is kinda wider spread but 405-450 nm. The problem is lenses are not coated to cover that wide of a spectrum to cover all three ...

IN GENERAL laser safety glasses are categorized by laser type and wavelength ... and power when you get into the hotter ones. The blue and green can kinda sorta be protected from by the orangish argon type lenses ... red requires a different coating that a lot of the time is a greenish blue color ... but I don’t know of any lenses that protect across all 3.

From what I’ve seen on TV most rioters are using green ... and by the level of light and size of beam they are not using cheaper pointers like those for presentations ... they are not at the 5 mW green lasers (which is like Crimson Trace level) ... they’re running 50 mW ... 100 mW or more which will burn skin at a couple feet, pop balloons at a few yards or damage the eye at a couple hundred yards (at close up range burn the retina quickly). The higher powered ones are a couple hundred bucks and fairly large because a larger power source is needed ... we aren’t talking regular batteries here think Makita not Duracell. As to blue lasers which are far rarer they can go farther up in power and so does damage with it. Protection for the green and lower blue could be $25-$30 pair of safety glasses but if it’s a 150 mW green or blue laser then further coatings really are needed.

Truth be told the people who fall victim to laser attacks will likely see floaters for the rest of their lives ... and with possibility they’ll get worse as their eyes age.
That is why I’m partially blind in the left eyy burned retina from a laser when I was in FT.RILEY
 
Maybe a better plan would be to fight fire with fire. Get a high power laser and use it on the antifa mob at eye level. I would never do that, but someone else might. Not at night, and not in smoke or anything that would give away your position. Or just use an IR or UV laser (not visible light).

That might put a damper on future mobs.
 
Maybe a better plan would be to fight fire with fire. Get a high power laser and use it on the antifa mob at eye level. I would never do that, but someone else might. Not at night, and not in smoke or anything that would give away your position. Or just use an IR or UV laser (not visible light).

That might put a damper on future mobs.

My thoughts exactly.
 
Smoke or dust will help you locate a direction the laser is coming from rather quicky as well.
 
Maybe a better plan would be to fight fire with fire. Get a high power laser and use it on the antifa mob at eye level. I would never do that, but someone else might. Not at night, and not in smoke or anything that would give away your position. Or just use an IR or UV laser (not visible light).

That might put a damper on future mobs.
Why not go old school. Just drop a bunch of flash bangs in on them. :D
 
Not sure what the duty cycle of the LED Laser diodes are for that setup.
 
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