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As revealed on ITM earlier this week, up to 30 revellers partying at the Aquamarine Open Air Festival in Kirzhach, Russia, were hospitalised after giant lasers damaged their retinas following staging problems.
Local newspaper Kommersant said torrential storms prompted festival organisers to erect giant marquees over the dancefloor which led to the outdoor lasers being inadvertently trained on the crowd. “They all have retinal burns, scarring is visible on them,” an eye specialist told the newspaper. “Loss of vision in individual cases is as high as 80%, and regaining it is already impossible,” he added.
A story also appeared in New Scientist, who ironically just last month revealed that US Homeland Security are backing the development of laser guns amounting to ‘little more than a powerful strobe light’, as new non lethal devices for crowd control. “Wielded like a conventional gun, this weapon is designed to trigger ‘flicker illness’, the New Scientist explained. “A condition akin to severe motion sickness – which leaves the target dazed, nauseous or completely immobilised.”
‘Flicker Illness’ was only recently identified by US scientists as a definable condition, though health portal Headacheexpert.co.uk said strobe lights ‘commonly found at nightclubs and concerts’ are often to blame. “It has been known for some time that strobe lights can trigger epileptic seizures,” the headache portal explained. “But it is more recently that flickering lights have been implicated in headaches and related symptoms in otherwise healthy individuals.”
One of the best-known victims of strobe induced seizures remains Joy Division singer Ian Curtis, whose health deteriorated rapidly as he experienced increasingly severe fits when performing with the seminal post-punk band in the late 70s. New Order portal neworderonline.com described one such attack in 1980 when the band supported fellow punk pioneers the Stranglers at the Rainbow in London, which highlighted the ignorance about both strobes and epilepsy.
“The lighting crew at the Rainbow were unaware of Ian’s epilepsy, and, despite repeated requests to the contrary, kept on using strobe lights, which triggered one of Ian’s more serious attacks,” the article said. “He was sent staggering backwards into Steve’s drumkit. The audience simply interpreted this as the ‘grand finale’ of the gig and applauded even harder.”
