The video also showed the jet, which is painted yellow with the number 552 in red beneath the cockpit, successfully taking off from the carrier.
Since Dec. 23, Mr. Mineta said, the authorities have received 31 reports of lasers shined into the cockpits of airplanes as they were taking off or about to land at airports around the country.
Two specially-modified Westland-Wallace bi-planes with open cockpits were used for the feat, taking off from an airstrip in northern India to fly into the Himalayas over the 29,000ft (8,848m) summit.
When McHugh realized that the plane wasn't taking off, he rushed back to the cockpit to repeat his order, and Kilduff countermanded it.
The same month, a United States Air Force Mustang taking off from Suwon smashed into the cockpit of one of the Dakotas; none of the Australian crew was injured but the aircraft had to be written off and stripped for components by No. 491 Squadron.
Gibbes threw out his own parachute to make room in the cockpit for his passenger and lost part of his undercarriage taking off, necessitating a one-wheeled landing back at base.
Also today, investigators from the Bahamian Department of Civil Aviation, assisted by the United States National Transportation Safety Board, were again examining the engines, cockpit instruments and debris from the wrecked Cessna 402B, in Marsh Harbor to determine why it crashed shortly after taking off for Opa-Locka, Fla.
Pilots are so busy when taking off and landing that the Federal Aviation Administration forbids nonflight-related conversation below 10,000 feet, under the "sterile cockpit rule".
Piloting the GlobalFlyer, a specialized plane that featured 13 fuel tanks and a 7-foot (2-metre) cockpit, he took off from Salina, Kansas, on February 28 and returned there some 67 hours later, on March 3. On February 8 , 2006 he undertook the longest nonstop airplane flight, taking off from Cape Canaveral, Florida, aboard the GlobalFlyer.
