Air and Space Law Commons^™

Airport Noise As Public Bads: Comparative Remarks On Legal Challenges In Resolving The Neighbor Conflict Between The Airport And Landowners, Magdalena Habdas

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

Incompatible uses of land create neighbor conflicts connected with the notions of civil law immissions (non-trespassory invasions) or common law nuisance. These traditional instruments of resolving the neighbor conflict have their limitations when pollution (such as noise pollution produced by aviation) interferes with the use and enjoyment of land that affects numerous landowners. Lawmakers seek to resolve the neighbor conflict with public intervention in such circumstances. Instead of relying on the market, the state allocates entitlements, indicates how parties must behave, and prescribes the conditions under which lawmakers should conclude an agreement.

Interestingly, although the nuisance caused by airport noise …

Understanding An Outlier: The U.S. System Of Airport Governance And Economic Regulation, Robert A. Hazel

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

Unlike airports in many other countries which have been corporatized or privatized, nearly all U.S. airports continue to be operated by the public sector. They are subject to a system of economic regulation that provides little incentive to control costs or allocate capital efficiently. Yet, despite its apparent shortcomings, the current system has persisted over several decades. This Article explains the persistence of the current U.S. system of airport economic regulation based on price theory, regulatory economics, and public choice principles. It offers supporting empirical evidence for this equilibrium and identifies factors that might lead to a different outcome.

Elected …

Public Safety Concerns And Meeting The Dudenhoeffer Pleading Standard, Douglass G. Brown

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

This Comment analyzes the recent Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) stock drop cases against The Boeing Company (Boeing) and reviews the underlying pleading standard in these cases that the Supreme Court set forth in Fifth Third Bancorp v. Dudenhoeffer. With the tremendous amount of assets in retirement plans—and specifically in employee stock ownership plans—litigation under ERISA can be extremely costly to employers, especially those in the airline industry that offer these plans. The current pleading standard for stock drop cases has become a practically insurmountable barrier to plaintiffs, even when their employers know they are negligently creating products …

Back To Air In Disarray?: Disparity In Practices And Interpretations On Adizs Disrupting The Safety Of Civil Aviation, Sanghoon Lee

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

The interconnectivity of civil aviation has been long praised with the success of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) in harmonizing navigation standards and procedures, along with the utilization of Flight Information Regions (FIRs). However, continuing geopolitical tensions with different implementations of Air Defense Identification Zones (ADIZs) have belittled the technical achievement. Among different State practices, some ADIZs have expanded beyond territorial airspace and even overlapped with other FIRs, requiring overflying air- craft to submit flight plans and abide by procedures separate or in addition to air traffic control obligations.

The purpose of this Article is to review the ongoing …

Predicting Bearing Fault In The Drone Freight Industry: Legal Liability In Australia, Prue Vines, Anthony Song, Matthew Priestley, Elias Aboutanios

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

Many people are now aware of drones or remotely piloted aircraft (RPAs), and several others have predicted the significant impacts that drones will bring across society. Today, there is an expectation that drones will play a pivotal role in industries such as surveillance, security, surveying, construction, and freight transport. However, in all these cases, whenever a drone is flying over a populated area, it poses a danger to people or things on the ground. Perhaps the sector where the greatest risk of injury to the everyday person exists is the drone delivery industry. The drone freight industry is proliferating fast, …

Front Matter

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

No abstract provided.

Private Law Aspects Of Suborbital Flights: Second- And Third-Party Liability And Insurance, Tanja Masson-Zwaan

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

Two companies carried private citizens to the edge of space in July 2021. Although suborbital flights have so far taken place within one jurisdiction—they start and end in the same state, do not pass through foreign airspace, or meet both criteria—they will become international when transportation between two points in different states via outer space becomes a reality. International law is ambiguous about the regulation of suborbital flights; neither international air law nor international space law explicitly apply. It is also unclear which organization or institution should be mandated with the international regulation of suborbital flights. The legal uncertainties must …

Pulsed Nuclear Space Propulsion And International Law: Some Preliminary, Glenn Reynolds, Leigh Outten

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

Pulsed Nuclear Space Propulsion, researched in the 1950s and 1960s by such eminent physicists as Freeman Dyson, Ted Taylor, Theodore von Karman, and Hans Bethe, involves propelling large spacecraft using compact nuclear explosions from specialized atomic devices. This technology is often known by the name of the Air Force project in which it was developed: Orion. It has long been believed that the 1962 Limited Test Ban Treaty prohibits the use of nuclear pulse space propulsion. After a survey of the Orion project and its results and a review of the applicable law, this Article concludes that language in the …

Vertiports: Ready For Take-Off … And Landing, Benjamyn Scott

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

While aviation has been used in transportation for decades, the use of vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) aircraft for large-scale, low-cost, green, sustainable, and integrated mobility in populated areas is a new phenomenon. Despite the importance of ground infrastructure for embarkation and disembarkation of passengers, cargo, and mail, questions remain on how these “vertiports” are or should be regulated and how they will relate to existing regulated ground infrastructure such as aerodromes, airports, and heliports. Therefore, several questions arise: what is a vertiport; how do vertiports relate to other aviation infrastructure; what are the legal implications of having different terms; …

Cabotage And Deregulatory Anomalies, Timothy M. Ravich

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

The strangest airline route in America is between Pago Pago and the Manu’a Islands in American Samoa. No U.S. carrier serves this “domestic” route. Therefore, it is the only route between two points in the United States (or, more accurately, its territories) that is regularly scheduled service by a non-U.S.-flagged airline. The Pago Pago–Manu’a Islands flight is thus an unprecedented and unique exception to a federal law that permits only U.S. carriers operating U.S.-registered aircraft to fly between U.S. states and territories. Under existing U.S. cabotage policies, moreover, states and U.S. territories are divested of all power to manage …

At The Crossroads Between Bankruptcy And Aviation: The Proposed Bankruptcy Venue Reform And The Imperilment Of Foreign Airlines’ Availment To U.S. Bankruptcy Courts Under Chapter 11, Pauline Hodencq

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

The COVID-19 pandemic has wreaked havoc on several of the nation’s industries, aviation being no stranger given the financial difficulties, flight cancellations, and health mandates the sector consequently faced. Despite concerns that a wave of bankruptcy filings would submerge U.S. bankruptcy courts, the domestic need for restructuring did not arise as predicted, the main reason being the federal assistance provided to enterprises in peril. On the contrary, foreign debtor airlines were the ones to avail themselves of the experience and efficiency of magnet districts for restructuring under Chapter 11 of the Bankruptcy Code. Simultaneously, large domestic corporations sought the assistance …

Regulating Science Fiction: The Regulatory Deficiencies In A Rapidly Growing Commercial Space Industry, H. Austin Simpson

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

This Comment explores the deficiencies of the legal framework governing commercial space with the advent of satellite mega-constellations. The scope and size of these so-called constellations are completely unlike anything the space industry has contemplated since the first rocket was launched into orbit. Moreover, these constellations are an extremely new phenomenon—the prime movers in the industry are just beginning to create these massive man-made wonders in space. As such, the legal framework was designed around space operations that are much smaller in scope. That framework has struggled to keep pace with the rapidly growing commercial space industry generally and the …

Front Matter

Journal of Air Law and Commerce

No abstract provided.

Table Of Contents

Seattle University Law Review

Table of Contents

Securing The Precipitous Heights: U.S. Lawfare As A Means To Confront China At Sea, In Space, And Cyberspace, Garret S. Bowman

Pace International Law Review

No abstract provided.

Evaluating The Progress Of The Liberalization Of International Aviation Toward Open Skies, Tyler B. Spence, Daniel Friedenzohn, Steven M. Leib

Publications

The United States has engaged in well over 100 Open Skies Agreements with other ICAO member state partners reaching all parts of the globe. These Open Skies Agreements have established a practice of liberalization for airlines to have the most freedom to choose when, where, how often, and for how much they fly to locations. Despite a majority of ICAO member state partners engaging in Open Skies, there has been a reluctance of the member states to engage in the same practices with other aviation partners for similar access. A similar pattern is also evident for liberalization through the Freedoms …

Defend Forward & Sovereignty: How America’S Cyberwar Strategy Upholds International Law, Elya Taichman

University of Miami Inter-American Law Review

To thwart a seemingly neve rending bombardment of cyberattacks, the U.S. Department of Defense recently implemented a new strategy – defending forward. This approach demands persistently engaging the enemy on a daily basis to disrupt cyber activity. Rather than waiting to be attacked, the United States is bringing the fight to the enemy. However, this strategy poses fascinating and complex questions of international law. In particular, because most defend forward operations fall within the gray zone of warfare, it remains unclear whether these operations violate the sovereignty of American adversaries or even third party nation states in whose cyberspace U.S. …

On Solid Ground: How Sterling Strengthened Airspace Ownership Rights In Florida, Nicolas Torres

University of Miami Business Law Review

No other form of property ownership is as synonymous with Florida as the condominium. While ownership of airspace was possible under common law, modern condominiums are more accurately described as creatures of statute. Although the Florida Condominium Act (FCA) expressly provides for fee simple airspace ownership of condominium property, it had been unclear if the Act could provide for fee simple airspace ownership of non–condominium property. Sterling Breeze v. New Sterling Resorts cleared up that ambiguity and found that the FCA can provide for fee simple ownership of non–condominium airspace. First, this note will review the development of airspace ownership …

An Exclusive Property Model For The Common Heritage Of Mankind: A Multilateral Regime For Natural Resources In Outer Space, Yun Zhao, Xiaodao Li

Brooklyn Journal of International Law

The concept of the Common Heritage of Mankind (CHM) remains uncertain and controversial. This article starts with an analysis of the legal status of the CHM to identify the legal subjects who can exercise rights to the CHM and what types of rights they have. It is argued that an exclusive property model is the one successfully implemented in the law of sea regime., i.e., the CHM is defined as an exclusive property of mankind. Mankind, as a separate entity, can have ownership over the CHM, while other entities can only exercise usufruct to the CHM. This article moves further …

Beyond The Grave: A Fiduciary’S Access To A Decedent’S Digital Assets, Isabelle N. Sehati

Cardozo Law Review

No abstract provided.