According to Kerikmäe, Tanel, and Rull (2016) ,space tourism is any commercial activity which provides the customer with indirect or direct experience with space travel. These activities may have different features such as long term stays in orbit to short term suborbital or orbital flights or exposing passengers to gravity free experience through parabolic flights. The concept of space tourism where civilians are taken to space is gaining popularity. There have been flights which have taken tourist to the International Space Station. However attention is shifting towards sub-orbital flights which are comparatively cheaper than those to the ISS. Space tourism is subjected to various laws. These laws include rules regarding liability to passengers, registration, air space, privacy and third party liability.
Space tourism is one of the newest thing that is being explored in the domain of outer space, which enables civilians to have an experience of the space, directly or indirectly. It includes both long and short-term stays in the outer space, either in the orbital facility or by way of a quick sub-orbital flight. A tour into the space is gaining popularity among the civilians, which is giving a way to various agencies to come up with innovative ideas for entertaining people who are capable of shelling out a lump sum amount for an outer space tour. This research will help in the identification of the required protection to be provided to space travelers and whether the current law is adequate to meet the limitation and protection requirements.
Whether adequate protection is provided to civilians in space
Whether the limitations imposed on companies like SpaceX be increased in relation to space tourism
Whether the laws in relation to space tourism be amended
What are the basic protections which civilians may need in space
To analyze whether adequate protection is provided to civilians in space
To analyze whether the limitations imposed on companies like SpaceX be increased in relation to space tourism
To find out whether the laws in relation to space tourism be amended
To identify the basic protections which civilians may need in space
Space Policy
Space policy signifies the process of political decision making of a modern state pertaining to the exploration and use of outer space, for civilian (includes both commercial and scientific) and military purpose. It intersects with space science and defense policy for making anti-satellite weapons and for launching spy satellites. It helps in the creation and implementation of space law and advocacy.
Space law involves national and international laws, rules and regulations pertaining to the activities that occurs in outer space. Space law began its journey when Soviet Union launched the first artificial satellite of the world in 1957. The satellite, named Sputnik 1was launched as a part of International Geophysical year. Since then, space law has developed and gained significance as humankind has been evolving and relying on space-based resources. The Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS) has effected five international treaties:
Moon Treaty
Rescue Agreement
Registration Convention
Liability Convention
Among these, the Outer Space treaty hold the major significance for governing the activities of the countries for exploring the outer space, both for scientific and tourism interest. These treaties of international space law include non-appropriation of outer space by a single country, freedom of exploration, arms control, damage liability in space. The UN General Assembly embraced certain declaration of legal principles, which involves appropriate implementation of international space laws as well as cooperation between the countries. Along with the adherence to international laws, many countries have legislated national space laws as per their domain of interest on the matter.
Space tourism is one of the newest thing that is being explored in the domain of outer space, which enables civilians to have an experience of the space, directly or indirectly. It includes both long and short-term stays in the outer space, either in the orbital facility or by way of a quick sub-orbital flight. A tour into the space is gaining popularity among the civilians, which is giving a way to various agencies to come up with innovative ideas for entertaining people who are capable of shelling out a lump sum amount for an outer space tour.
Space law would have the exclusive applicability on activities related to space tourism. National authorities grant the authorization pertaining to space tourism, in accordance with the appropriate legal provisions of space law. Air law will be applicable to aircrafts and space vehicles that are associated with a satellite launch, while space law would be applicable to the space objects that are meant to be launched in the outer space. Both international and national law requires an aircraft and a spacecraft to have authorization of the appropriate authority. Similarly, for commercial or tourism purpose when a space capsule is launched, it must be authorized. By way of the Article VI of the Outer Space Treaty, countries are under obligation to authorize, subsequently monitor and supervise the activities of their national space activity, be it tourism related or scientific. This obligation of the countries are in accordance with the national space legislations, specially a regime that provides them license to give authorization to spacecraft, space activities, tourisms for civilians, etcetera. Countries like USA, Germany, Australia, Europe and Russia has national legislations that give them the license of authorization. However, national legislations of the countries pertaining to space lacks serious commitment and relevant provisions in relation to Space tourisms. USA is among the first to legislate an extensive regulation which covers the outer space activities at length in its Commercial Space Launch Amendment Act of 2004 (CSLAA). For example, it has incorporated a provision for an additional authorization for the space vehicle if it is carrying a human being. The majorly important requirement for authorizing a space vehicle to carry human participants includes the following criteria:
Written information about the obligation of the licensee to the human participant’
Written consent of the human participant,
Physical examination of the participant,
Training and education of the participant to survive in the spacecraft,
Other necessary requirements like security, basic needs, etcetera.
The Commercial Space Launch Amendment Act of 2004 (CSLAA)gives a clear picture of these necessities. These guidelines of the Act serves as a protection to the civilian or militant participant.
Liability and its nature is an important matter of interest to the operators of the space tourism who are required to evaluate their potential risk, in term of finance and license holding capacity. Liability includes ‘passenger liability’ and ‘third-party liability’, which is to be considered differently by the agencies who are operating space tourism. The agencies are protected by contractual agreement with the voluntary participants and the tourist who wish to have an experience of the outer space. In such matters, third parties are not involved and bears no contractual obligation with the participant or the space tour operator. The passengers are supposed to take the risk of exploration voluntarily for participating in the flight.
The Montreal Convention and its provisions on liability are to be followedpertaining to the liability of the participant, in case any damage or injury is caused to him. The Convention strive to prove unlimited liability to the carriers and participants. However, unlimited liability may diminish to limited liability if the operate proves that all the necessary measures were adopted to protect the carrier. It is to be noted that the Montreal Convention does not cover the space vehicle once it is separated from the aircraft. In that case, Space law may be applicable to the space vehicle after it is separated by using the rocket propulsion for thrust.
The Liability Convention, on the other hand, can be applied to passengers of a space vehicle. Article VII of the Convention makes it clear that passengers are covered from injury as they technically not ‘participating’ in the operation. However, it is apparent that a person who participates in a space mission is likely to put himself or herself into risk. Therefore, it is obvious that passengers are not likely to ask for compensation under Liability Convention.
The Rome Conventionregulates the third party liability pertaining to the transportation by aircraft. The Convention offers liability only to the third party, who is the owner of the aircraft, and not the tour operator or the agency conducting the tour. Therefore, the liability can be presumed to be limited. The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) is planning to revise the third-party liability of the Rome Convention and adopt a similar two-tier liability policy of the Montreal Convention.
In conclusion, it can be laid down that the Montreal Convention is applicable to the liability of the passenger while Rome Convention covers the liability of the third party pertaining to the damage of the space vehicle, which is subsequently resulting to the physical injury of the participant and monetary damage of the owner of the spacecraft respectively.
SpaceX has been transporting supplies to the International Space Station (ISS) and proposed a plan to take humans for a space tour by 2019. The CEO of SpaceX says that they are devoting their focus on building the ‘big Falcon Rocket’ (BFR) which is much larger than it previous Dragon Capsule which would facilitate the company to accommodate more guests into it.
Virgin Galactic is the pioneer company who had made the world dream about ‘space tourism’ for the first time. In the late 2000s, the founder of the company, Sir Richard Branson had proposed that civilians would have the privilege to explore the unexplored arena of the outer space. However, the company could not keep its promise. Currently, they are working on a project that aspire to fly tourists in the space.
Blue Origin proposes to deliver a traditional astronaut like experience to the passengers who wish to sign up for a space tour. They gives a picture of passengers being strapped into the large capsule like seats in a massive rocket that would take them into space. The company proposes to reuse the rocket for further trips, which potentially makes the cost of the tickets lesser than what other companies would charge.
In spite of all the proposals made by the civilian space agencies, multiple limitations are imposed on them for conducting their proposed projects like space tourism. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) restricted SpaceX from telecasting its live video coverage of its rocket launch. Such stringent restriction are a result of the 1992 guideline in the National and Commercial Space Program Act which requires the civilian space agencies to hold a license to telecast images and videos of their spacecraft launch. This statute restricts the space agencies to take an image of the Earth without a ‘commercial remote sensing license’.
For deriving the results of a research in an effective and accurate manner it is extremely important that the procedures of; conducting the research, collecting the data, analyzing the data, and deriving a conclusion; are adhered to in a coherent manner. In this particular section an account of the methodological aspects adhered to while conducting the research shall be provided. The following sections shall be providing an overview of the;research philosophy that has shaped the research, the approach employed, the data collection method, the code of ethics that have been adhered to, the reliability and the validity of the research and the limitations of the research project.
Of the many philosophies that are generally employed in conducting researches, the positivist and the interpretivist philosophy has been deemed fit for this particular context.
The positivist philosophy of research refers to the strand of thought which is concerned with the factor of scientific temperament and objectivity of the outcomes of a particular research. The central argument of this philosophy is that researches are activities which should be aimed at reaching the truth, and they must be applicable generally to all contexts invariably when it is applied in circumstances and conditions that are similar. The scope for the influence of any personal bias, value perceptions, assumptions, conjectures in order to reach at a conclusion is strictly absent, as it interferes with the objectivity of the results. Another factor, which is extremely important for characterizing the positivist research philosophy is that of the verifiability of the results. To ensure the maintenance of the factor of objectivity of the research conclusions, the method of conducting the research strictly adheres to the procedures of empiricism, which consists of data collection, observation, verification of the results is strictly followed, adhering to the principles of scientism. This particular was deemed necessary to govern the process of research for the sake of deriving accurate results.
The interpretivist philosophy seeks to balance out the lacuna in the social basis of the research as a result of the positivist philosophy overpowering the research conclusions with scientism. It might as well so happen that the generalizations arrived at by some researches might be countered by other scholars and that can nullify the generalizations arrived at by conducting a research that is inspired only by the positivist philosophy. The social constructivists have stressed upon the point that the theoretical meaning must be made an attempt to understand so that the effect of a particular result could be understood and explained in a better way. By being too objective, the significance and the importance and at the same time the relevance of subjective experiences are belittled. The interpretivists do not consider the positivists to be irrelevant, but they are however not favourably disposed towards the idea that the positivist method is the only proper method of conducting a research. Hence, to have a proper balance between subjectivity and objectivity, both the positivist and the interpretivist philosophies have been given due importance in governing the research process.
The approach that has been employed for governing the research process has been deductive. That means, the net results or the inferences of the research thesis are but an appropriation, or a summation of the viewpoints that have been propounded by the scholars who have previously worked in the field which has been chosen for analysis in this particular research project. This particular approach has been applied since this particular research is inspired both by the positivist and the interpretivist philosophies. The appropriation and the summation of the views propounded by the previous scholars shall not be without the mention of the personal value perceptions in this particular context, hence the deductive approach has been employed. The aim is also not to reach at any theory, rather, the aim is to testify the existing theories and mention about their relevance in this particular context. Another reason behind choosing the deductive approach is that the type of data which has been collected is secondary in nature, and so is the methodology applied.
As it has already been mentioned that the approach applied in this particular research has been deductive, hence the only possible and the feasible choice of methodology for this particular research has been qualitative. The sources have been secondary. They consist of the literature that already exist in the particular field of enquiry, which have been analyzed against the existing theoretical constructions. The deriving of the inferences have not been relied upon any primary data. Due to the problems of the time constraint and the lack of funding sources, the collection of primary data and resorting to quantitative research method has been refrained from.
The relevance and the validity of any research rests upon the adherence of the research to the code of conduct set for the conducting of the research in a just manner. It is considered as an act of academic misconduct to make use of concepts and ideas propounded by other scholars and not giving them the credit that they deserve. It is in academic terms called as the act of plagiarism. To avoid such instances, the ideas, concepts and theories have been cited properly following the standard and academically recognized style. This was also necessary in ensuring the authenticity and relevance of the research that has been conducted.
The research is reliable as all the code of ethics and standard methods of conducting the research has been adhered to. The usage of reliable literature, of notable scholars for analysis has been resorted to, which accounts for the validity of the research.
The only limitation of this particular research is that no substantial amount of quantitative research could be conducted due to the logistical difficulties that have been faced in the process of research. The only contribution thus has been limited only to providing a new angle of viewing the existing set of literature.
There are various laws which have been made in relation to the space. However as the concept of space travel by civilians is relatively very new there are not laws which have been specifically set out for protection of their rights of civilian in space. Space law would have the exclusive applicability on activities related to space tourism. National authorities grant the authorization pertaining to space tourism, in accordance with the appropriate legal provisions of space law. Air law will be applicable to aircrafts and space vehicles that are associated with a satellite launch, while space law would be applicable to the space objects that are meant to be launched in the outer space. Both international and national law requires an aircraft and a spacecraft to have authorization of the appropriate authority. Similarly, for commercial or tourism purpose when a space capsule is launched, it must be authorized. By way of the Article VI of the Outer Space Treaty, countries are under obligation to authorize, subsequently monitor and supervise the activities of their national space activity, be it tourism related or scientific. This obligation of the countries are in accordance with the national space legislations, specially a regime that provides them license to give authorization to spacecraft, space activities, tourisms for civilians, etcetera. Countries like USA, Germany, Australia, Europe and Russia has national legislations that give them the license of authorization. However, national legislations of the countries pertaining to space lacks serious commitment and relevant provisions in relation to Space tourisms. USA is among the first to legislate an extensive regulation which covers the outer space activities at length in its Commercial Space Launch Amendment Act of 2004 (CSLAA). In the light of these findings the probable outcome of the research would be that adequate protection is not available to civilians in space . The limitations imposed on companies like SpaceX be increased in relation to space tourism and specifically aligned with civilian rights such as the right to privacy. There is a definite need that laws in relation to space tourism be amended. The basic protections which civilians may need in space include privacy and safety.
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