Space Tourism: Some Lessons to be Learned from its Brother ‘The Aviation Sector’
- Paper number
IAC-07-E6.2.09
- Author
Ms. Sagee Geetha Sasikumar, University College Dublin, Ireland
- Year
2007
- Abstract
The use of aero-space flights in space tourism, requires it to perform both functions of the air flight and the space flight, thus making it difficult to be governed by the current regulations of either the air law or space law. This has been an ongoing debate, also in the COPOUS. The aviation industry is regulated by international conventions and strong international organisations like IATA and ICAO. With the influx of space tourism and the lack of similar international frameworks for its regulation, time has been ripe for similar requirements. Many of the regulations of the aviation could be applied to the space tourism as well, though there might be few which may be distinct. Some attempts are made by countries such as US, to bring about regulation in this aspect. Furthermore, most of the aerospace research is undertaken by the US and the Government of US will most probably be making a regulatory structure to organise space tourism in the near future. At the same time, there are plans to make space ports in Dubai, Singapore, Finland, Scotland, etc. This will bring in trans-national issues which cannot be addressed by a national regulatory body. Hence there is a need of a international regulatory body to reach a set rules to organise this sector. There is also the issue of co-ordinating with the airline industry during launch and re-entry phase. The paper intend to make a study on the available national laws and policies as well as the law relating to the aviation industry and see what principles could be borrowed from it.
- Abstract document