Talk to Congress about Commercial Human Spaceflight

On 9 Oct 2003 19:13:34 -0700, in a place far, far away,
made the phosphor on my monitor glow in such a way
as to indicate that:


HR 3245 does not give AST the power to restrict human access
to space. The proposed restriction is not on the spaceflight
participant; it's on the licensee. HR 3245 would do nothing
more than require the licensee to set standards, and then meet
them. It does not give AST veto power over those standards; it
merely says the licensee must have standards and stick to them.
That's reasonable.

It would be reasonable, if it were that straightforward, but that's
not my interpretation of the language as presently exists. To wit:

"...the spaceflight participant has received training and met medical
or other standards specified in the license"

Since the license itself must be approved by OCST (or FAA-AST, or
whoever) it implies to me that they will approve (or not) the
standards as well. This must be resolved, and the sooner the better.

--
simberg.interglobal.org * 310 372-7963 (CA) 307 739-1296 (Jackson Hole)
interglobal space lines * 307 733-1715 (Fax) http://www.interglobal.org

"Extraordinary launch vehicles require extraordinary markets..."
Swap the first . and @ and throw out the ".trash" to email me.
Here's my email address for autospammers:

(David Gump) wrote in message . com...

What's not safe: enforceable medical standards and any "other"
standard that might appear to be a good idea to the fine professionals
at the FAA, whom I admire.

You appear to be assuming that it will be FAA setting the medical and
other standards. It's a reasonable assumption. But the language
doesn't support it. The standards are specified in the license. But
the license essentially consists of the license application plus a
cover letter signed by the Licensing and Safety Division Manager of
AST. In essence, the applicant writes the license, and AST says yea
or nay. So the standards specified in the license are the standards
the applicant sets.

Surely, then, AST would deny the license application if they didn't
approve of the medical and other standards set therein? No; they
can't. They don't have the authority. The Commercial Space Launch
Act of 1984 requires the Secretary of Transportation to issue a launch
license if the proposed launch is consistent with the public health
and safety, safety of property, and national security and foreign
policy interests of the United States. Nothing in passenger medical
or other standards has any influence over any of those. Therefore
medical or other standards, or lack thereof, cannot be used to deny a
launch license.

What HR 3245 says is that the launch licensee: must have medical and
other standards for spaceflight participants; must specify those
standards in its launch license; and must comply with those standards.
It says nothing about AST adopting any medical or other standards.
Considering that the physical environments will be quite different
from one vehicle architecture to the next - compare Xerus and Black
Armadillo, for example - the appropriate medical standards will be
equally varied, and AST would have great difficulty adopting a uniform
medical standard. HR 3245 quite wisely leaves the development of
these standards to the vehicle developer.

So, to answer your question:

So what standards will the FAA adopt?

Yours.


Randall Clague
Government Liaison
XCOR Aerospace

wrote in message . com...
(David Gump) wrote in message . com...

You appear to be assuming that it will be FAA setting the medical and
other standards. But... the standards are specified in the license. ... In essence, the applicant writes the license, and AST says yea
or nay. So the standards specified in the license are the standards
the applicant sets.

So, to answer your question:

So what standards will the FAA adopt?

Yours.


Randall Clague
Government Liaison
XCOR Aerospace


Launch firms submit license applications that respond to very specific
requirements laid down by AST. For example, AST is extremely specific
about what numerical standards must be met for risk to the public for
overflights of populated areas. The applicant has *zero* leeway to
offer a different standard. So, you are right that launch companies
can sumbit a license with any content they dream up, but
non-conforming applications will be quickly rejected.

We don't want AST to start down the path of establishing similar
standards for medical and any "other" thing that might seem a good
idea. We want AST to do something very useful, which is get access to
the NASA and IMBP data bases on previous travelers, and to gather
stats on passengers taking the new vehicles, and make them available
to all space transportation companies in ways that protect privacy
while revealing issues and countermeasures that we ought to know
about. Passengers and their doctors then can use this background
information considering what it means to the specific passenger, and
whether to sign the informed consent forms that acknowledge that
orbital space travel will have risks unlike taking a vacation in
Bermuda.

(GCHudson) writes:

Ed asks for support of H. R. 3245, and while I would normally not wish to
challenge anyone seeking to help open the space frontier, I have serious doubts
about the wisdom and timeliness of this particular piece of legislation. The
argument for and against AST is too long to go into here, and I will shortly
address it in another public print forum, but setting that aside (suffice to
say that I think AVR is a better choice) I would like to draw attention to the
following proposed provisions of the Act:


`(c) COMPLIANCE WITH SPACEFLIGHT PARTICIPANT REQUIREMENTS- The holder
of a license under this chapter may launch or reenter a spaceflight
participant only if--

`(1) the spaceflight participant has received training and met medical
or other standards specified in the license;

`(2) the spaceflight participant is informed of the safety record of
the launch or reentry vehicle type; and

`(3) the launch or reentry vehicle is marked in a manner specified by
the Secretary of Transportation which identifies it as a launch or
reentry vehicle rather than an aircraft.'


I submit that this is nothing more than the "Space Precautionary Act"
mentioned by Heinlein in his short story 'Requiem.'


Would it be unfair of me to note that the SPA of "Requiem" certainly
permitted and perhaps fostered a commercial environment that included
everything from suborbital barnstorming to cities on the moon, that
what sticking points the SPA might have offered were generally well
lubricated by an established smuggling community, and that the main
obstacle to DD's trip was not the government but the board of directors
of his own corporation?

Bring it on.


AST cannot be trusted this the power to restrict human access to space
on "medical or other" grounds.

I do not think the regulations can be worded in such a manner as to deny
them, or AVR or anyone else, that power. Which is not to say that the
wording of the regulations is wholly unimportant, but far more important
is the character of the regulator.

AST is new, and flexible, and apparently willing to work with us. No
matter how the regulations are worded, I think I prefer them to AVR,
or to almost anyone else I can imagine.


--
*John Schilling * "Anything worth doing, *
*Member:AIAA,NRA,ACLU,SAS,LP * is worth doing for money" *
*Chief Scientist & General Partner * -13th Rule of Acquisition *
*White Elephant Research, LLC * "There is no substitute *
* for success" *
*661-951-9107 or 661-275-6795 * -58th Rule of Acquisition *

(John Schilling) wrote in message ...

AST cannot be trusted this the power to restrict human access to
space
on "medical or other" grounds.

I do not think the regulations can be worded in such a manner as to deny
them, or AVR or anyone else, that power.

This is a key point people seem to be overlooking. There is nothing
that explicitly denies AST the power to create medical standards right
now, and I know for a fact that AST has already been thinking about
what those standards should be. This bill doesn't give AST any powers
they don't already believe they have right now. Allowing companies to
create their own medical standards, with AST approval, is probably
better than having AST create a one-size-fits-all standard. If you
don't like the current language, I invite you to suggest substitute
language. Please note that this is not moot court -- any language we
suggest must be politically acceptable to members of Congress. A
blanket declaration of laissez-faire principles would be a really hard
sell. Of course, if enough people are willing to help sell it, maybe
we could. For that reason, the opinions of people who are willing to
show up and work the Hill with us will count much more than those who
merely coach from the sidelines. (No offense intended to anyone, I'm
just trying to be pragmatic here. If we can't pass a bill, it doesn't
matter how perfect it was.)

(David Gump) wrote in message . com...

We don't want AST to start down the path of establishing similar
standards for medical and any "other" thing that might seem a good
idea. We want AST to do something very useful, which is get access to
the NASA and IMBP data bases on previous travelers, and to gather
stats on passengers taking the new vehicles, and make them available
to all space transportation companies in ways that protect privacy
while revealing issues and countermeasures that we ought to know
about. Passengers and their doctors then can use this background
information considering what it means to the specific passenger, and
whether to sign the informed consent forms that acknowledge that
orbital space travel will have risks unlike taking a vacation in
Bermuda.

I think there's going to be more to it than that, David. A spaceflight
operator will have to know that a passenger is compatible with the
vehicle systems, just like any other component. Things as simple as
fitting into an ejection seat, for example. Whether you call these
medical standards or human factors, an operator is going to have set
some limits on who they can accept. It can't just be left up to a
passenger and his doctor because certain conditions could endanger the
vehicle. I think operators could do this without AST involvement, but
if AST wants to see those standards as part of the license
application, I can live with that, as long as AST evaluates them in a
reasonable manner. Having those standards written into the license
might even provide some protection against nuisance suits, when an
operator has to turn someone down for medical reasons.

On Thu, 09 Oct 2003 23:54:20 GMT, in a place far, far away,
h (Rand Simberg) made the phosphor on my
monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:

I've put up a blog post with a preliminary analysis of the proposed
legislation (and taken the liberty of incorporating David's
comments--I trust he'll tell me if that's a problem).

http://www.interglobal.org/weblog/ar...48.html#003148

I've got some follow-up thoughts there now.

On rereading (and after talking about it to a couple people this
weekend at the Space Frontier Conference, including Jim Muncy and Jay
Garvin of AST), I'm much less concerned now about the medical and
training standards issue, and I've summarized the pertinent effects of
the legislation. In short, while it could possibly be improved with a
little more explicitness, I support the legislation, and consider it a
major step forward from the current situation.

--
simberg.interglobal.org * 310 372-7963 (CA) 307 739-1296 (Jackson Hole)
interglobal space lines * 307 733-1715 (Fax) http://www.interglobal.org

"Extraordinary launch vehicles require extraordinary markets..."
Swap the first . and @ and throw out the ".trash" to email me.
Here's my email address for autospammers: