How close did HR 5382 come to not passing the Senate Wednesday night? Very close, by some accounts. The bill was the last in a group of bills that the Senate passed by unanimous consent Wednesday night (although the Senate did approve one final bill supporting spectrum reallocation for Enhanced 911 services immediately before adjourning.) According to an email sent out by Americans for Space, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, who was managing the approval of that series of bills, almost seemed to be taken aback by the appearance of HR 5382:
Frist, while explaining to the President of the Senate that no other legislation was before him to move on, was handed a one page document that stopped him in mid sentence to ask for unanimous consent from the Senate that HR 5382 be considered read for the third time and passed by the Senate. No object was raised and the presiding President of the Senate ordered it passed.
The official Congressional Record transcript of the bill’s passage doesn’t reflect this, though.
So what happened? In a Cosmic Log blog entry, MSNBC’s Alan Boyle notes that Sen. John McCain had put a hold on this and other legislation sent over from the House until he could would out an agreement with Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX), to take up boxing-reform legislation next year. Meanwhile, Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV), who will be minority leader next year, persuaded recalcitrant colleagues not to block the bill. The Space Foundation also recognized Reid in a press release for his efforts, along with a couple of other Senators not previously associated with the bill: Sen. Ernest Hollings (D-SC), the retiring ranking member of the Senate Commerce Committee, and Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA).
Not everyone is happy with the bill, though. In an analysis piece for UPI, Robert Zimmerman notes that the bill “contains ominous possibilities for squelching this hatchling industry”, referring to safety regulations included in the bill. Referring to a provision that requires FAA/AST to regulate after any event that poses a high rick of death or injury, he claims that “if this language had been in force last October, the uncontrolled spins experienced by SpaceShipOne during its first X Prize flight would have forced AST to halt the second flight, thereby preventing Bert [sic] Rutan’s ship from winning the $10 million award.” [Update 12/10 6:15 pm: I’m told that UPI has issued an edited version of this article with the sentence quoted above deleted.]
Might have caused the AST to halt the second flight would be better wording for Zimmerman’s point. It was an unplanned event, but whether spins with virtually no air resistance risk serious injury so as to force a grounding is something for the AST to decide. There is no forcing the AST to do anything other than consider safety in the bill as passed. Given the ASTs willingness to waive other license requirements, I have to think they would have let SS1 fly. At the risk of self indulgence, I wonder whether he was badly paraphrasing my space review piece. That said, there is a serious risk of problems down the road, when U.S. pride is not directly at stake, and I hope the AST keeps up its current trend towards actually promoting commercial actiivty.
I concur…I think that the “conclusions” about SS1 are “premature”. The FAA understands “flight test”.
Robert
I think the unforeseen event is a euphimism for something. I don’t think it is a bit of a spin. If no one gets hurt, the bill appears to assure that there will only be light handed regulation for 8 years. That is an eternity for the feds. Think about what the tax code is slated to look like in 8 years: pretty much back to the pre-2001 tax code.
“Meanwhile, Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV), who will be minority leader next year, persuaded recalcitrant colleagues not to block the bill. The Space Foundation also recognized Reid in a press release for his efforts, along with a couple of other Senators not previously associated with the bill: Sen. Ernest Hollings (D-SC), the retiring ranking member of the Senate Commerce Committee, and Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA).”
Let us remember that our dream is not exclusively a Republican dream. There are Democrats who support our goals, and, if we want them to succeed, it behooves us to reach out to them. As I have argued before, we need as broad a coalition as possible.
— Donald
Donald,
As a Republican, I couldn’t agree with you more. Sen. Reid deserves HUGE credit for having resolved several Democratic Senator holds, all of which were instigated by House Transportation Ranking Member James Oberstar, who had tried to block passage of HR5382 in the House.
This was a bipartisan victory for a non-partisan goal: opening the space frontier to the American people.
– Jim
Thanks, Jim.
It’s good to hear from you again. I hope things are going well in your life.
— Donald
As you might imagine, I’ve followed CSLAA pretty closely… I disagree with Mr. Zimmerman’s conclusion on two counts.
First, nothing in CSLAA, had it been in effect for the X Prize flights, would have forced AST to do anything. It would have allowed AST to do something, if AST determined that the 20+ rolls were “an unplanned event or series of events during a licensed or permitted commercial human space flight that posed a high risk of causing a serious or fatal injury to crew or space flight participants.” The rolls were unplanned, yes. But given that Mike zeroed out the rates long before reentry, it’s pretty hard to call them a high risk event.
The second point is what the unplanned event, had AST judged it high risk, would have allowed AST to do, if CSLAA had then been in effect. What it would allowed them to do is restrict or prohibit the risky operating practice – for passenger flights *only*. Nothing in CSLAA allows AST to restrict or prohibit design features or operating practices for flights not carrying paying passengers.
So under CSLAA, AST could – if they determined those rolls were high risk, which would be a difficult determination to defend given the demonstrated safe outcome – issue regulations directing an operator of SpaceShipTwo to avoid, while carrying paying passengers, aerodynamic conditions that lead to lots of rolls as he exits the atmosphere. AST could also, if they determined the rolls were high risk, issue regulations requiring Burt to modify the design for SpaceShipTwo so it doesn’t do that. So what? He’s going to do that anyway. “SpaceShipTwo has got to have better high-Mach directional stability by a bunch,” –Burt at the SFF banquet in Long Beach
Nothing in CSLAA is bad. Some of the particulars are in law earlier than we expected them, but we knew we’d see them eventually. It’s a pretty good bill. CSLAA may be fairly thought of as the Air Commerce Act for space. The Air Commerce Act was basically the enabling legislation for the nascent commercial human flight industry. (_Bonfires to Beacons_ {Smithsonian History of Aviation Series} is a marvelous history of the times and events leading to the Air Commerce Act; highly recommended.)
Thanks for the insight Randall. I know I havent been paying enough attention to the paid passenger restriction on the crew and passenger safety provisions. Best of luck with the Sphinx and Xerus vehicles.