What to Do if You’re Hit with a Laser Strike

A recent FAA report suggests that these incidents are happening more often. How should you handle it if one happens to you?

Michael Wildes

Tuesday, February 08, 2022 at 09:51 AM ET

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You’re most likely to be affected by laser strikes at low altitudes, in critical phases of flight, and at night. [File Photo Courtesy: NBAA]

Key Takeaways:

Laser strikes on aircraft reached an all-time high in 2021, increasing 41% from the previous year, despite significant fines and potential criminal penalties for violators.
These strikes pose a severe hazard to pilots, causing distraction, flash blindness, glare, and even temporary total vision loss, especially during critical low-altitude flight phases and at night.
Pilots can mitigate the risks by ensuring a clean windscreen, trimming the aircraft for stability, being prepared for go-arounds, communicating with ATC, and following FAA guidelines such as averting eyes, turning up cockpit lights, and using peripheral vision.

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The FAA recently reported that laser strikes reached an all-time high in 2021, with 9,723 reports of such strikes from pilots. This is a 41 percent increase from 2020, when pilots reported 6,852 laser strikes. Indeed, the dangerous trend only keeps climbing year after year, even though the FAA has tried to educate the public on the dangerous effects of shining a laser at an aircraft.

[Courtesy: U.S. Department of Transportation]

Even worse, between 2004—when the FAA began tracking the total number of U.S. laser/aircraft incidents—and December 31, 2021, the number of incidents totaled 71,435.