If you’ve watched footage from the protests in Cairo, you’ve undoubtedly seen the lasers people are waving around. Well, there are a *lot* of them. And they are being used to light up military helicopters, with the potential of blinding the pilots. Check out photos:

Egypt crisis: Why are Cairo protesters using laser pens?

Egyptian Protesters Bombard Helicopter With Lasers (PHOTOS)

The claim is that these are being used in a celebratory fashion, not as weapons.  Keep in mind, this is an area of the world where people celebrate weddings and whatnot by spraying automatic weapons fire into the sky, so it’s hardly surprising that lasers are being used in this fashion. But hosing down helicopters with powerful lasers (note that the lasers lighting up the chopper are green and blue, indicating lasers of perhaps 1.4 watts output, where a standard laser pointer is limited by law to 5 milliwatts) is a damned fine way to blind the pilots.