US: Man with "red beam" in glasses tries to enter cockpit

A man dressed strangely and acting suspiciously demanded to see the pilot of his American Airlines flight, about 15 minutes after takeoff from Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport on March 16 2012. Passenger Lori Barber said “he was wearing two pairs of glasses, one with a red beam coming out of the lens.” The unidentified man was subdued and the flight continued to its destination, Los Angeles International Airport. He was taken into custody by the FBI after AA flight 2401 landed. American Airlines officials said the man had no weapons.

The nature of the glasses is a mystery. Although a Gizmodo headline said the man wore “laser glasses”, the word “laser” was not used in the original CBS DFW story used as Gizmodo’s source.

A photo (above) taken by Barber shows the man wearing two pairs of glasses. A Google Image search for “laser glasses” and “laser pointer glasses” turned up one type of laser-emitting glasses but these have a different design: thick rims with a silver laser embedded above the nose. An eBay search turned up a similar pair; these do not appear to match either of the man’s glasses.

A search for LED (non-laser) glasses turned up a few with thick temples and a white area near the hinge, such as this pair and this pair, both of which emit a broad beam of white light:

However, LaserPointerSafety.com was unable to find commercially-sold glasses that emit red light and which look like one of the two pairs shown in Barber’s photo.

From CBS DFW and NBC DFW

Tags: US, Dallas, Airplane, Color: Red, FBI, Laser inside aircraft, Photo: Suspect, Photo: Other