More homeowners are abandoning traditional Christmas lights for laser displays this holiday season. But pilots especially want you to be careful about where you're aiming them.
Nathanial Rhodes is gearing up for his synchronized musical display in Sparks, called Light Show Bro. While he untangles thousands of feet of extension cord for the 20,000 lights on his property, one part of the installation comes easy: the laser beams.
"Fortunately our property is laid out in such a way where we can put them parallel to the ground. So they can cover the house but from a long distance away. So I don't need to set them right in front and point them straight up," said Rhodes.
The lasers can go quite the distance and if the lights happen to catch a pilot's eye, that can be a real problem.
"The beam gets bigger and bigger the higher in altitude it goes, so it can be very large, very distracting and blinding to a pilot," said Rhodes.
While the decorative house lights are not as blinding as laser pointers, a flight nurse with Careflight says they are still dangerous.
"We may be doing some intricate task on the patient at that time and the pilot may bank because he tries to get away from the laser. So even more dangerous," said Markus Dorsey-Hirt, with Careflight. "Night vision is really important for our pilots and we also fly with night vision goggles. So if one of these lasers hit the cockpit, it can light up the entire aircraft and actually inhibit the pilot's vision."
If the laser projector is aimed a little high, some of the lasers will not hit the roof of the house, they'll keep going into space. So the FAA is asking homeowners to make sure their decorations aren't pointed up in the air or to pull the plug on them altogether.
In fact, the holiday laser lights being sold at Home Depot this season come with a warning for homeowners, especially if they live within 10 miles of an airport.
"Make sure that it's not pointing into the sky. If you're near an airport, you really want it to be focused on the home. You don't want it up in the air, where it could possibly interfere with any flight paths of aircraft," said Randy Dugan, the Department Supervisor for Home Depot on South Virginia Street.
It's unlikely that the FAA will come after you for accidentally shining a holiday display at a plane, but you could be asked to re-adjust your lights.
A spokesman for the FAA sent us this statement:
“Our concerns about lasers – regardless of the source – is that they not be aimed at aircraft where the beams can threaten the safety of a flight by distracting or blinding pilots. Consumers who buy these new light displays should take precautions to make sure that the lights are hitting their houses and not shining off into the sky. If we became aware of a situation where a laser light display affected pilots, we would start by asking the person to either adjust them or turn them off.”
For more information on this, go to https://www.faa.gov/about/initiatives/lasers/
Light Show Bro Musical Display in Sparks: http://www.lightshowbro.com/
- Located at 5555 Junction Peak Drive, in Sparks, off of Sparks Blvd. & Ion Dr.
- November 30th - December 31st
- The 13 minute show runs daily, every half hour, starting at 5:00 p.m. with the last show running at 9:30 p.m.
