Three planes hit by lasers near Dallas Love Field

Lasers aimed at planes a growing trend, official says.

Imagine a bright green light shining in your eyes while you’re trying to fly a 75-ton jetliner full of hundreds of passengers.

On Wednesday night, more than 20 aircraft across the U.S. were struck by laser beams aimed from the ground, including three planes in the Dallas area, according to the Federal Aviation Administration.

“Anytime you have multiple strikes, it’s unusual,” FAA spokesman Lynn Lunsford said about Dallas’ trio of incidents. “Hardly a week goes by in the Dallas-Fort Worth area that we don’t get one or two” laser strikes.

In July, for example, an Alvarado man was arrested for allegedly shining a laser pointer into the cockpits of at least eight commercial planes as well as at the helicopters sent to look for him.

What about 20 laser strikes nationally? “I would say it was a busy night, but not unusual,” Lunsford said. “We routinely see between 15 and 25 or 30 a night.”

Shining a laser at an aircraft has been a federal crime since early 2012 because it’s a safety hazard. A person doing so faces up to 20 years behind bars and a fine.

Lasers aimed at planes are a growing problem, Lunsford said. Lasers cause a visual distraction and can lead to temporary blindness and longer-term eye damage. In some cases, pilots have had eye injuries that required medical treatment.

“Our main concern is with the safety of the aircraft,” Lunsford said. “You don’t want to have a situation where the pilot can’t fly.”

The FAA is looking at a record number of laser incidents this year: 5,352 were reported nationwide as of Oct. 16, up from 3,894 for all of 2014. The Dallas-Fort Worth area has seen a record 115 laser strikes reported as of Oct. 16, up from about 85 for all of last year.

The Dallas-Fort Worth area ranks fifth nationally for the most reported laser strikes so far this year, after Los Angeles with 197, Phoenix with 183, Houston with 151 and Las Vegas with 132.

The FAA sees no particular pattern in the top spots, except people have easy access to electronics stores where they can “buy a laser for under $30 that will easily cast a beam that goes for 3 to 5 miles,” Lunsford said.

The planes struck by lasers Wednesday night around Dallas were flying at altitudes between 3,000 and 4,000 feet, according to the FAA.

The pilots of three planes — a Southwest Airlines 737, a Virgin America A319 and a private business jet — reported a laser beam coming from the same general area as they flew into Dallas Love Field, according to the FAA. The incidents occurred about 11 miles southeast of Dallas between 7:30 and 7:45 p.m.

The FAA, FBI and Dallas police are investigating the local incidents.