[Postgrad] Safety notice about laser thermometers

[Adrian Cross]

Dear All

In view of a recent incident please note the following important points:

a) The university has strict policies on accident reporting (see 

www.strath.ac.uk/media/ps/safetyservices/campusonly/forms/media_32859_en.pdf). 

If you are unsure whether an incident perceived to be minor warrants 
reporting via an accident and dangerous occurrence report form (S1), 
please ask your supervisor or the dept. safety convenor (Adrian Cross) 
or deputy (John Gillan) or, for lasers, the dept. radiation protection 
officer (Thorsten Ackemann) or deputy (Gregor Welsh) for guidance.

b) For private and university use: Portable and in particular hand-held 
surveillance equipment like range finders or thermometers often contain 
visible lasers as guiding or measurement lasers, which have a higher 
power than the limit considered to be safe (1 mW in the visible spectrum). 
These are so-called class 3R lasers with a power in the 1-5 mW range. 
They are available off-the-shelf in DIY departments and their use is considered 
to be low risk, but it must be noted that care needs to be taken to make sure people 
are not inadvertently exposed to the beam, in particular the eyes. 

First, exposure could be harmful under adverse conditions as class 3R lasers exceed the safe 
limit. Second, you cannot assume that their actual output power is within the class R limit as some 
companies want to impress users with a bright appearance and sometimes the laser can be mislabelled 
if the company has poor monitoring and quality control procedures in place. The same holds for laser pointers.

Kind regards

Adrian

*******************************************
Adrian Cross
Professor of Atoms, Beams and Plasmas
Department of Physics
University of Strathclyde
John Anderson Building
107 Rottenrow East
Glasgow G4 0NG
Scotland, UK

Office: John Anderson Building, JA 6.19
Tel.: +44-(0)141-548 4614
Email: a.w.cross at strath.ac.uk
webpage: http://reld.phys.strath.ac.uk/index.php?page=intro