NASA the Space Organization of America is facing legal trouble after a Florida household filed a complaint against the organization due to the space debris of 2.9 tons falling on their house.
The debris was of the used cylinder of the International Space Station (ISS), that fell on their rooftop and made a hole causing huge damage to the house.
The family has sued NASA and is now seeking $ 80k from the organization as compensation amount for the damage caused by the incident.
The International Space Station separated the used structure in March 2021 which was expected to be burned completely when it entered in the Earth's atmosphere. But the structure didn't burn and entered the atmosphere as a huge piece, creating damage.
NASA after the incident of the damage reported to them collected the metal structure to analyse and later after identifying it they found out that it was a part of the cargo pallet.
In the interview with Forbes McGill University associate professor Andrea Harrington shared that the issue will be handled by the government and mentioned in his statement that “ like any other case of damage caused by the government to private parties.”
The concerns regarding issues like these happening in future have started raising among the people, if in the future similar incident happens whom to report and what action to take.
This concern is addressed by Harrington, who is the co-directs McGill’s Institute of Air and Space Law said that under the Liability Convention and Outer Space Treaty, if the material landed in another country aside from the US, the U.S. government itself would be liable to pay the government of that country.
In the treaty it is mentioned that the US is liable to pay damages if in the future a similar situation is caused by any private US firm, the company will pay compensation to the US government.
Since the space object has landed abroad NASA has 6 months' time to deal with the incident, both the government and this private organization will be dealing under the US laws, as they have to respond in the time given to the organization.
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