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| Person Questioned About Laser Beam, Planes | |
| 2005-01-01 | |
| TRENTON, N.J. (AP) - A laser beam was aimed at a police helicopter Friday - one of several incidents involving aircraft across the country in the past week - and federal authorities were questioning someone who had been at a house where they said the light had originated. Officials said no one was hurt when the laser hit the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey police helicopter as it flew over an area where a similar incident occurred Wednesday. Soon after, Port Authority officials and the FBI went to a Parsippany home where they had tracked the laser beam and were questioning a person there in connection with both incidents, said Steve Coleman, an authority spokesman. No charges had been filed as of late Friday night, Coleman said. Police in the helicopter were trying to pinpoint the spot where three green lasers were pointed at a pilot preparing to land a plane at Teterboro Airport on Wednesday night. The force's superintendent and some detectives were in the helicopter at the time, Coleman said. The plane involved in Wednesday's incident, a corporate-owned Cessna Citation with 13 people aboard, was about 11 miles from the airport when the incident occurred, authorities said. It landed safely and no injuries were reported. Federal agents are looking into several recent incidents involving lasers and aircraft, including cases in Cleveland, Washington, Houston, Colorado Springs, Colo., and Medford, Ore. In some cases the lasers locked onto aircraft several thousand feet up as they approached airports for landing. Though there have been no reports of accidents caused by lasers, they can temporarily blind and disorient a pilot and could lead to a plane crash. The FBI is investigating whether the incidents are pranks, accidents or something more sinister.
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| Posted by:Steve White |
| #7 Parabellum, URL too long? Go to tinyurl.com and shrink it. Or you could just, you know, embed it. (Warning: registration required.) |
| Posted by: Angie Schultz 2005-01-01 7:00:19 PM |
| #6 Don't the commercial airplanes have enough black boxex in them that they can fly and land without any one at the controls? Very large commercial passenger jet liners usually have sufficiently advanced ILS (Instrument Landing System) gear and correspondingly sophisticated autopilots whereby they can land completely unattended. According to aviation industry scuttlebutt, the Boeing 777 can take off and land at an overseas destination without a moment of pilot intervention. That was why selling China Boeing 767s required congressional approval. Their avonics package was of such quality that it could also be used to guide an ICBM. Smaller planes, like the Cessna Citation mentioned in the above article, are wholly reliant upon their flight deck to get them safely back on the ground. The person who was doing this knew full well the potential consequences of his acts. Felony imprisonment should await any conviction. PS: Parabellum, URL too long? Go to tinyurl.com and shrink it. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2005-01-01 5:16:16 PM |
| #5 Update from bergen.com (URL too long to post) Authorities went in and out of the house, but would not comment. Neighbors said a young couple with three young children live at the address. The front yard had a large Christmas display. |
| Posted by: Parabellum 2005-01-01 10:02:03 AM |
| #4 I don't know much about the other places this has been occuring but Parsippany NJ has a very large Islamic population. My money is on something more sinister as well. |
| Posted by: JerseyMike 2005-01-01 8:56:28 AM |
| #3 Don't the commercial airplanes have enough black boxex in them that they can fly and land without any one at the controls? |
| Posted by: Mrs. Davis 2005-01-01 8:37:05 AM |
| #2 If you automatically threw everyone who ever did this sort of thing into jail without trial, your false conviction rate would be 0.000001%. The potential for death (in the air and upon the ground) on a massive scale is so magnified, despite its still unlikely outcome, that there is a particularly callous indifference to human life involved with such an act. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2005-01-01 3:28:18 AM |
| #1 Illuminated a helicopter? Well, he's not a research scientist, that's certain. Airplanes are one thing - a helicopter, a POLICE helicopter, and the one that happens to be carrying the guy tasked with locating the asshat with the laser, lol, now that takes both some sheer stupidity and then an added massive dose of Lady Luck giving him the finger. 'Tard. If they find the evidence, I hope they throw him into the slammer - and tell the population he's a child molester - prank or not. Some jackass stunts just aren't funny. Ever. |
| Posted by: .com 2005-01-01 2:31:30 AM |