Lasers at the airport Pierre-Elliott-Trudeau : Marc Garneau furious

Raymond Filion

Tuesday, 13 February 2018 17:32

UPDATE
Tuesday, 13 February, 2018 18:13

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OTTAWA, on | Six incidents involving lasers pointed at aircraft were reported last week near the airport Pierre-Elliott-Trudeau airport, in Montreal.

The federal minister of Transport, Marc Garneau, says he is furious about the situation, claiming that such a gesture can endanger the crew and passengers of the aircraft.

“It can have catastrophic consequences. […] If they point a laser into the cockpit of an airplane that is in the process of landing, the aircraft may crash. There may be hundreds of dead”, said the minister Garneau during a press conference in Ottawa Tuesday.

The reported incidents would have occurred on February 5 and 6 so that a green laser was pointed at aircraft about to land at Montréal-Trudeau. One of the aircraft referred to was a Boeing 767.

Pointing a laser at an aircraft is a criminal act. Offenders are liable to maximum fines of $ 100,000 and a prison sentence of 5 years.

“We started a campaign last year called “not a brillant idea”. It has reduced the number of incidents. In 2016, it was 527. Last year, it was 379. We are going in the right direction”, however, has tempered the minister Garneau. Among the incidents reported in the year 2017, 128 occurred in Quebec.