There are cases where military aircraft pointed their lasers (likely invisible IR lasers) at photographers. It's unclear if this was intentional and what kind of laser (e.g. rangefinder or designator) it was, but the laser likely wasn't meant as a weapons system but still fried the camera, with visible scorch marks.
I can't imagine eyes faring much better than the sensor if hit.
[1] https://petapixel.com/2021/08/02/sony-officially-warns-that-...
The lasers used in light shows are only allowed because they're moving; if you looked directly down the beam while it held still your blink reflex would not save your vision. Fortunately, you've got natural liquid cooling: your cornea is bathed in tears and your retina is surrounded by fluid-filled tissues, so there's a safety window of a few milliseconds while the laser pans across your eyeball too fast to cause dangerous temperature rise. If the laser beam slows down - if the encoders/resolvers on the galvanometers register insufficient change in the mirror angles - the controller will shut off the laser.
I don't have sufficient trust in my own professional, methodical, high-quality work using top dollar equipment to open up a machine without safety eyewear and lock out/tag out procedures; I have even less trust in products for the lower-margin, faster-paced entertainment industry. On top of that, it would not surprise me if a camera sensor has slightly less heatsinking compared to human eyeballs...but the fact that the safety margin is so thin that cameras can be damaged makes me not want to go to a light show!
Seconded.
Telecoms laser engineer here, and amateur musician. I'm astounded how casually class 3B and class 4 lasers are treated in the entertainment industry, or that using them in free space with poor travel limit stops / beam containment is even legal..... Often it appears little-to-no consideration is given as to what happens if a beam becomes misaligned or reflected into the audience.
You only have one set of eyes.
My roommate in college was a stagehand, we talked a bit about the safety and it appears the consideration is more on the scale of "We try not to shine the lasers in people's eyes" and less like "We have redundant, proven processes that ensure people cannot be harmed."
It feels like they've missed an important distinction between what's acceptable for your own purposes and what's acceptable risk to impose on someone else. Safety when messing about in your own backyard would often not pass OSHA requirements, that makes sense because it's your own risk and your own reward, this is ethically different an industrial scenario where you're forcing someone who's just trying to feed their family to endanger their eyes for someone else's profitability, similarly, concertgoers should and do assume that entertainment light shows are safe, while [some in] the entertainment industry take it much more casually.
See the comment below regarding concerns of misalignment, limit stops & containment for beams with the power to cause permanent blindness. I'm sure some venues handle this safely [1], but powerful lasers are being treated far to casually for my liking.
[1] Though I wonder what would happen if you asked for a copy of their risk assessment?
Modern show lasers are more likely to be around 1W for smaller events, around 20W for stadiums and up to 100W for the biggest outdoor events. Getting the beam from any of those in your eye will blind you almost instantly.
So audience scanning is carefully calibrated. The lasers are set up either to scan balconies and ceilings, to move at a certain velocity to minimise dwell time, to lose most of their brightness below a certain height - or all of the above.
Professional shows require a "variance" - basically regulation and associated paperwork - to make sure no one is hurt.
Of course any idiot can buy a 1W show laser for less than $1k now, but the US has quite strict legal requirements for public use, and anyone who causes serious eye damage is potentially on the hook for a law suit and bankruptcy.
"they make sure there are none"
A reflective surface may appear anywhere at any time.
A concert-goer may release a balloon, or have a phone on a selfie stick, or the machine may be bumped.