Definition
A film of dust, oil, smudges, scratches, or moisture on the inside or outside of an aircraft windscreen that scatters incoming light and reduces visual clarity, especially at night when oncoming light from stars, ground sources, or other aircraft spreads into glare and washes out faint objects.
Plain English
A dirty or smudged windscreen that makes it harder to see clearly, particularly at night when small light sources turn into a fuzzy glare that hides things you would otherwise notice.
Context Anchor
Encountered during night flying, preflight inspection, and cockpit cleaning, especially when checking whether the windscreen is clear enough for good outside visibility.
Why Pilots Care
It scatters light and creates visual illusions that degrade night vision, raising the chance of disorientation or missing runway cues on approach.
Analogy
Like driving toward headlights through a smudged car windshield -- the lights bloom into a wide glare and you lose the detail behind them.
Grounding Statement
A thin film on the windscreen may be barely noticeable in daylight but can turn bright lights into a distracting glow at night.
Intuition Check
Do not confuse windscreen haze with weather haze in the air. Here, the problem is on or in the aircraft’s front window, not in the surrounding atmosphere.
Example Sentence 1
Before a night flight, the pilot wiped the inside of the windscreen to remove fingerprints and dust that could cause windscreen haze.
Example Sentence 2
Windscreen haze turned the approach lights into starbursts, making it harder to judge the proper glide path.