[Marxism] Congress OKs private-spaceflight bill

["Lil Joe" <joe_radical@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Congress OKs private-spaceflight bill
Senate's 11th-hour approval opens way for tourism
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/6682611/

By Alan Boyle
Science editor
MSNBC
Updated: 3:09 p.m. ET Dec. 9, 2004WASHINGTON - On the verge of adjournment
Wednesday, the U.S. Senate gave final congressional approval to a bill that
could open the way for suborbital space tourism.

The Commercial Space Launch Amendments Act, or H.R. 5382, now goes to the
White House for President Bush's signature. It would put a clear legislative
stamp on regulations already being put in place by the Federal Aviation
Administration ? and more significantly, allow paying passengers to fly on
suborbital launch vehicles at their own risk.

The age of commercial space travel got its start this summer with
SpaceShipOne's first private-sector spaceflights. Since then, hundreds of
would-be tourists, including William Shatner of "Star Trek" fame and "Alien"
actress Sigourney Weaver, have voiced interest in taking their own
suborbital space trips aboard the successors to SpaceShipOne, which may be
ready for flight by 2007.

The backers of H.R. 5382 said the legislation was needed to reassure
potential investors, such as Virgin Group billionaire Richard Branson, that
they would not face crippling lawsuits in an inherently risky business.

Space policy consultant James Muncy, who has been following the
legislation's up-and-down course closely, explained that the law would help
the infant suborbital industry "get through the 21st-century equivalent of
the barnstorming era."

Safety concerns
Under the terms of the legislation, the FAA would regulate the industry over
the next eight years primarily to protect the uninvolved public and the
public interest. The agency would start regulating space vehicles to ensure
crew and passenger safety only if the operation of those vehicles resulted
in death, serious injury or a dangerous close call.

Starting in 2012, the FAA could regulate suborbital spaceships however it
saw fit.

The bill's backers said the eight-year period would give spaceship
developers more freedom to experiment and also allow them to generate
revenue by taking on passengers, as long as those passengers knew exactly
what they were getting into.

That two-step regulatory regime rubbed some House Democrats the wrong way.
During last month's floor debate, Rep. James Oberstar, D-Minn., said the
legislation could encourage a "tombstone mentality," in which regulators
would have to stand by until someone got killed or seriously hurt.
Nevertheless, the bill was resurrected and approved by the House, 269-120,
on the last full day of last month's lame-duck session.

In the Senate, the behind-the-scenes debate over the bill went on until
almost literally the last minute. Firm opposition from even one senator
could have stymied the bill, and if the Senate did not act before ending its
session, the legislation's backers would have had to start from scratch next
year ? potentially delaying the industry's development.

In the end, the legislation was tacked onto a package of House bills that
were approved by unanimous consent in the Senate.

'Great victory'
The bill's sponsor, Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-Calif., said in a press
statement that the legislation's passage was a "great victory for the future
of America's space efforts."

?The people who will invest the type of big dollars necessary to make this a
major new step in mankind?s ascent into space have been waiting for the
government to lay down the regulatory regime and set the rules of the game,
and this is the first major step toward doing that,? he said.



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