{"id":16242,"date":"2026-07-14T15:45:00","date_gmt":"2026-07-14T22:45:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/14\/why-do-american-soldiers-use-red-light-at-night\/"},"modified":"2026-07-15T01:02:52","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T08:02:52","slug":"why-do-american-soldiers-use-red-light-at-night","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/14\/why-do-american-soldiers-use-red-light-at-night\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Do American Soldiers Use Red Light At Night?"},"content":{"rendered":"
Humans have poor night vision, especially compared to most animals. In fact, according to a study published by Science Daily, frogs may have the best night vision, as they can distinguish colors in bright situations where humans can only see darkness. However, despite the limitations of the human eye, military operations are not limited to daylight hours. Darkness can be used as a tactical advantage, although some light is necessary. The trick is, how do you provide enough light for the soldiers to operate without giving away their position?<\/p>\n
Red lights are used by the military because they allow soldiers to see better in the dark without interfering with natural night vision. Even better, the red light is invisible at long distances, making it a challenge for enemy forces to detect. This is very different from the night vision goggles that came into military use from the 1930s, which relied on heavy equipment.<\/p>\n
There are various situations where these red lights come in handy, such as when ground troops are wandering around in the dark and need to confirm their location. In addition, cruise ships are lit red inside and out sometimes. This allows the crew to be visible enough to monitor their equipment and those working on the flight deck can see to do their jobs without turning the ship into a bright beacon that is easy to see with the naked eye.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
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Why does the color red not reduce night vision?<\/h2>\n
\n \n \n <\/source><\/source><\/picture>\n US Navy \/ Getty Images<\/span>\n <\/div>\n
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When you try to see at night, your eyes work harder to provide more information by dilating your pupils, allowing as much light as possible. The retina then takes this light and using special receptors (rods and cones), turns it into signals for your brain’s processes to be seen.<\/p>\n
Colors are measured by wavelength, and in terms of visible light, red has the longest wavelength at 700 nanometers (nm). Human eyes can normally distinguish colors between 380 to 700 nm. When you are exposed to a dark place for a few minutes, your body releases rhodopsin, which is a chemical that helps a person’s eyes see better at night. The problem is, this chemical quickly disappears when exposed to bright light even for a short time.<\/p>\n
However, red light does not cause rhodopsin to decay, which is what allows soldiers or sailors to continue to maintain good night vision. In addition, red light may not only be beneficial to the military, but may also have additional health benefits. According to one study, the perception of aging improved significantly after daily exposure to red light.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
Considering one of the reasons why soldiers use red light is to be less visible to enemy forces, you may wonder why it is used on submarines. After all, these ships are designed to go underwater and are sealed shut, making even the bright lights inside impossible to be seen by anyone outside the sub. However, the red light actually helps to solve a critical problem that affects the health of the whole group: separating day from night. And this becomes critical given how long a military submarine can stay under water, which is months.<\/p>\n
Your body has a built-in clock, called a circadian rhythm, to tell you when it’s time to wake up and go to sleep. Without external signs such as the sun or the moon, people’s circadian rhythms can be disrupted, leading to sleep problems, among other things. Naval submarines can use bright white lights during the day but switch to red lights at night, which helps maintain some similarity to the natural day-night cycle.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
Sunan Wongsa-nga\/Getty Images Humans have poor night vision, especially compared to most animals. In fact, according to a study published by Science Daily, frogs may have the best night vision, as they can distinguish colors in bright situations where humans can only see darkness. However, despite the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":16243,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-16242","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-smartphones-tablets"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16242","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16242"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16242\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16244,"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16242\/revisions\/16244"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16243"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16242"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16242"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.runwayritz.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16242"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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