Someone pointed a laser at Oregon boat crew. The Coast Guard wants to find the culprit
The Coast Guard is looking for a suspect who pointed a laser at a Station Portland boat crew on the Willamette River, according to a release from the agency.
The strike took place on Jan. 12, which is at least the third time in a year and the second time in five months that someone hit Coast Guard crews with a laser pointer, previous releases from the agency say.
The crew aboard the 29-foot Response Boat-Small was hit with a green laser light in the cabin while it was “conducting underway operations,” the release said. The laser reportedly came from a building on the southern shore of the Willamette River west of the Fremont Bridge.
“Laser incidents are incredibly dangerous, put the safety of our boat crews in jeopardy and degrade our ability to navigate and respond to emergencies,” Lt. Cmdr. Colin Fogarty, enforcement chief, Sector Columbia River, said in the release. “We ask the public to understand the dangers associated with playing with lasers and how they disrupt our crews from responding to mariners in distress.”
The crew was evaluated on scene, but a spokesperson for Coast Guard 13th District Pacific Northwest told McClatchy News in a phone interview that it cannot release the crew’s medical information.
Last August, a Coast Guard boat crew from Station Seattle conducting a search and rescue operation was struck by a laser near Point Wells, a release from the agency says. While there were no immediate injuries reported from the laser strike, many crew members said they experienced pain and discomfort in their eyes after exposure, according to the release.
Almost exactly a year before the incident in Portland, a suspect pointed a laser at a Coast Guard air crew from Station Port Angeles, a 2020 release says. The strike took place during a flying mission northwest of Bremerton on Jan. 10, according to the release.
“Laser pointers can cause danger to Coast Guard air and boat crews due to glare, afterimage, flash blindness or temporary loss of night vision,” a release from Station Seattle says. “If a laser is shined in the eyes of an aircrew member, Coast Guard flight rules dictate that the aircraft must abort its mission.”
Striking a boat with a laser pointer on United States waters is a felony, the Coast Guard said.
This story was originally published January 20, 2021 at 8:31 PM with the headline "Someone pointed a laser at Oregon boat crew. The Coast Guard wants to find the culprit."