It went wrong

Someone has chosen the wrong opponent, a French ATLANTIQUE maritime reconnaissance aircraft.

The Marine Nationale announced that one of its Atlantique 2 MPAs had been shot at with a laser in Brittany. The aircraft used its own sensors to identify and locate the person, who was then arrested fairly quickly.

The incident took place on the evening of 4 January 2022, when the ATL2 was on final approach to Lann-Bihoué airbase when a madman began targeting the aircraft with a laser. The pilot then aborted the landing. The crew was then able to localise the source of the laser "very precisely" using their technical equipment, which a civilian aircraft does not have and which the perpetrator was apparently unable to assess. One of these sensors was probably the Wescam MX-20 EO/IR imaging system, which has an inertial measurement unit that enables high target localisation accuracy and georeferencing.

The initial detection was probably made by the pilots, but the rapid detection is the result of routine training. The crew was able to identify the offender and use the sensor to record evidence of the offence. While still in the air, the "sky sailors" (as aircrew are known in the French Navy) transmitted this data to the local police station, who quickly apprehended the offender and confiscated his equipment. Charges were filed and the investigation is ongoing.

Unfortunately, this is not the first time ATL2 crews have faced this problem. In 2018, someone was sentenced to six months' imprisonment for similar behaviour at the same naval air base. According to the local newspaper Ouest France, the commander of the Lann-Bihoué naval air base reported in 2014 that ten military aircraft had been shot at with a laser in just nine months. Apparently the bad guys don't learn, because the crews are simply better equipped.

Incidentally, the German navy has the same photo equipment component, but it doesn't happen in Nordholz....