CALSTAR 6 air ambulance pilots operating helicopters around Lake Tahoe are successfully using military-grade night vision goggles to navigate around mountain peaks and bad weather to transport patients from the South Lake Tahoe (California) area to emergency rooms in Reno.
According to the article in the Tahoe Daily Tribune, the pilots have been using the night vision devices for about five years now. They report the technology has significantly improved the safety and efficiency of their nighttime operations.
“…they provided us more ability to take care of patients. That’s what it boils down to really. Because we wouldn’t have been able to do the flight tonight, possibly, without goggles,” Langevin added. “Which means that patient is delayed in his care, and he was in serious condition, and therefore he would have suffered, had we not had the ability to have these goggles.”
We concur. More and more of our business is coming from non-military organizations who are finding all kinds of applications for night vision, thermal imaging and infrared illumination systems. It’s always interesting to see something which was originally a military technology put to peaceful use in areas such as search and rescue and wildlife conservation.
