Feb 9 2005
From The Space Library
The U.S. House Transportation and Infrastructure Subcommittee on Aviation held a hearing to explore the regulation of the nascent commercial spaceflight industry. Members of the newly formed Personal Spaceflight Federation and its Industry Consensus Standards Organization voiced their concern that the government would attempt to implement additional regulations, thereby overregulating the new industry and stifling innovation. The Commercial Space Launch Amendments Act of 2004 required the FAA to issue licenses for the launches of privately built spacecraft and had given the FAA three years to issue rules for licensing. However, the Act also prohibited the FAA from issuing safety regulations for passengers and crew for eight years, unless specific design features or operating practices had resulted in serious or fatal injuries. U.S. Representative James L. Oberstar (D-MN), ranking member of the Transportation Committee, objected to that approach and had introduced his own bill (H.R. 656), requiring the FAA to include in its licensing rules minimum safety and health standards for spacecraft passengers and crew. FAA Administrator Marion C. Blakey agreed with regulation of private spaceflight in principle but suggested that such oversight needed to develop alongside the industry, emphasizing the difficulty in stipulating regulations for vehicles that did not yet exist. (Leslie Miller for the Associated Press, “Space Entrepreneurs Fret Over Federal Regulation,” 10 February 2005; Kelly Young, “Fledgling 'Space Federation' Fears Over-Regulation,” New Scientist, 11 February 2005; Beth Dickey, “FAA Proposes Rules for Future Spaceliners,” Government Executive, 15 February 2005; U.S. Congress, House of Representatives, Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, Subcommittee on Aviation, Commercial Space Transportation: Beyond the X Prize, 109th Cong., 1st sess., 9 February 2005.)
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