Timeline for Did NASA refuse to pay a $400 fine for littering caused by the deorbiting of Skylab?
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
22 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| S Jun 22, 2017 at 5:44 | history | bounty ended | Zaibis | ||
| S Jun 22, 2017 at 5:44 | history | notice removed | Zaibis | ||
| Jun 21, 2017 at 14:14 | comment | added | PoloHoleSet | @Zabis - the law specifically states that a person can be cited for breaking the littering law. When it comes to law, exact wording makes all the difference. A juristic person is usually considered so for issues regarding tort liability, not for individual actions. The littering ordinance is a fine for an offense, it is not a financial reparation for costs incurred. The fine is not reclamation of costs. Both of your arguments seem to depend on that definition, which is more a philosophical extrapolation on your part, IMO. Interesting issues to consider, though. Thanks! | |
| Jun 21, 2017 at 12:36 | vote | accept | Zaibis | ||
| Jun 21, 2017 at 6:10 | comment | added | Zaibis | @PoloHoleSet: For the "NASA is not a 'person'" statement. I doubt you are here right as well. I just can talk for Germany with certainty, but her companies and organizations fall under the term "juristic person" which is considered to be a "person". And I couldn't imagine that would be different for the USA or Australia. | |
| Jun 21, 2017 at 6:07 | comment | added | Zaibis | @PoloHoleSet: I might be wrong here, But in legal terms we are talking about a damage if something produces costs to me I hadn't without that occurrence. So cleaning the litter will have produced costs and therefor actually IS an damage... For the part of municipality versus nation you are right. I thought a bit too far when I wrote this statements as I wasn't aware the fine was just meant as joke and therefor, thought about a case having been escalated to some degree where it would be in the end represented by the nation. Feels somewhat nit picky to me, but yeah you are right about that. | |
| Jun 15, 2017 at 18:31 | comment | added | PoloHoleSet | "damage" <> "litter", "the municipality of Esperance" <> "nation of Australia." I'm not sure what the law was before the Litter Act of 1979 (for western Australia) went into effect, but looking at that legislation, the crime of littering is defined by saying that "any person" who litters is committing a crime. NASA is not a "person," so it wouldn't fall under the current littering statute. Perhaps entities like companies or organizations fall under pollution laws. In any case, it is not clear that there is legal standing to issue the citation. | |
| Jun 15, 2017 at 8:17 | answer | added | Just J for now | timeline score: 18 | |
| S Jun 15, 2017 at 7:05 | history | bounty started | Zaibis | ||
| S Jun 15, 2017 at 7:05 | history | notice added | Zaibis | Draw attention | |
| Aug 17, 2016 at 6:46 | comment | added | Zaibis | @Bakuriu: AFAIK there is an international consense about space exploration that damage caused by an object in any case the liability to it is in hands of the one who shot it up in space/controlled it from there. Otherwise I could assume other states might not tolerate it so much letting space vehicles pass over there lands. I mean I could understand if it where Northkorea who would argue that they have no obligation to pay any fines. but this is Australia and USA. Why should this international consense here not apply? | |
| Aug 17, 2016 at 6:39 | comment | added | Zaibis | @JanDvorak: it is not the fueltank that hit anything. the lab broke apart over the indian ocean and quiet a lot of some milimeter up to a few centimeter parts littered all over the city. it is not a fine for some damage, caused to any object, but the fine for cleaning the littering all over the city. | |
| S Aug 16, 2016 at 13:50 | history | suggested | jwodder | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
Proofreading
|
| Aug 16, 2016 at 13:45 | history | tweeted | twitter.com/StackSkeptic/status/765544975455121408 | ||
| Aug 16, 2016 at 10:49 | comment | added | Bakuriu | Fines produced by random countries where you don't have any kind of legal presence are useless... | |
| Aug 16, 2016 at 3:44 | comment | added | John Dvorak | Apologies for that, but my point still stands - nowhere does it say (or at least not in the quoted part) that NASA actively refused to pay the fine. Perhaps they didn't get to know about the fine, or perhaps they shrugged it off as a joke. TBH, $400 seems like nothing compared to the actual damage I would expect a fuel tank falling on a city to cause. The wiki article on Skylab uses the term "facetiously fined NASA". | |
| Aug 16, 2016 at 3:28 | comment | added | Nate Eldredge | @JanDvorak: Esperance isn't an island, it's a town on the mainland of Australia. | |
| Aug 16, 2016 at 3:26 | comment | added | Nate Eldredge | The question "why should they refuse" might be your way of suggesting that the claim is dubious, but actually trying to determine why they refused (if they did) would be beyond the scope of this site. | |
| Aug 15, 2016 at 23:45 | review | Suggested edits | |||
| S Aug 16, 2016 at 13:50 | |||||
| Aug 15, 2016 at 22:30 | comment | added | John Dvorak | Perhaps NASA didn't even know they were supposed to pay off $400 to some random island in the Indian Ocean. | |
| Aug 15, 2016 at 21:42 | review | First posts | |||
| Aug 16, 2016 at 10:05 | |||||
| Aug 15, 2016 at 21:42 | history | asked | Zaibis | CC BY-SA 3.0 |