[SUBMITTED] Commercial Spaceflight Safety

[The COT Corporation]

OOC: Those are two separate categories. Pick one. Evaluating the language of the proposal is difficult without knowing what category it's been written for.

OOC: I would say that it aims to advance the industry more than regulate, so I'll change it to just advancement. If you see more of a reason for it be regulation, let me know why and I'll change it.

OOC: I disagree. Although it depends on your views on what "advancement of industry" is. Seeing as the legislation states:

Urges member states to, even if in opposition to the advancement of the space industry, become more aware of and familiar with the regular space activities of other nations, to avoid public panic, misidentification of flying objects by foreign militaries, or fear-driven action against sanctioned space activity.

I would change the category to regulation, instead.

[Kaschovia]

OOC: I would say that it aims to advance the industry more than regulate, so I'll change it to just advancement. If you see more of a reason for it be regulation, let me know why and I'll change it.

OOC: I disagree. Although it depends on your views on what "advancement of industry" is. Seeing as the legislation states:

Urges member states to, even if in opposition to the advancement of the space industry, become more aware of and familiar with the regular space activities of other nations, to avoid public panic, misidentification of flying objects by foreign militaries, or fear-driven action against sanctioned space activity.

I would change the category to regulation, instead.

"That part is referring to nations who may oppose the advancement of the industry, rather than saying that the resolution is in opposition. That clause urges nations who might not be as open to the advancement of the industry to keep an open mind and become more aware of the fact that there are many nations ou there who will partake in space activities."

[The COT Corporation]

OOC: I disagree. Although it depends on your views on what "advancement of industry" is. Seeing as the legislation states:


I would change the category to regulation, instead.

"That part is referring to nations who may oppose the advancement of the industry, rather than saying that the resolution is in opposition. That clause urges nations who might not be as open to the advancement of the industry to keep an open mind and become more aware of the fact that there are many nations out there who will partake in space activities."

"Ah, ok. I didn't understand the wording entirely. I merely thought that you were implying that the nations should become aware of other nation's space activities, even if it was in opposition of advancement of industry. Sorry About the fuss.

[Kaschovia]

"That part is referring to nations who may oppose the advancement of the industry, rather than saying that the resolution is in opposition. That clause urges nations who might not be as open to the advancement of the industry to keep an open mind and become more aware of the fact that there are many nations out there who will partake in space activities."

"Ah, ok. I didn't understand the wording entirely. I merely thought that you were implying that the nations should become aware of other nation's space activities, even if it was in opposition of advancement of industry. Sorry About the fuss.

"Now worries at all, Ambassador. Please, let me know if you have any other thoughts."

[The COT Corporation]

"Ah, ok. I didn't understand the wording entirely. I merely thought that you were implying that the nations should become aware of other nation's space activities, even if it was in opposition of advancement of industry. Sorry About the fuss.

"Now worries at all, Ambassador. Please, let me know if you have any other thoughts."

"I actually don't! This resolution doesn't have any problems, in my eyes."

[Kaschovia]

"Now worries at all, Ambassador. Please, let me know if you have any other thoughts."

"I actually don't! This resolution doesn't have any problems, in my eyes."

"Thank you! I appreciate the support. Although I do believe there could be some things I haven't yet considered, it is good to know that you would be in support of this if it ever came to vote."

[Araraukar]

OOC: Advancement of Industry is a category that has areas of effect instead of strengths. Which AoE is this meant to be in?

[Kaschovia]

OOC: Advancement of Industry is a category that has areas of effect instead of strengths. Which AoE is this meant to be in?

OOC: I'm really not quite sure. I feel inclined to change it to Regulation.

[Maowi]

OOC: This is of little consequence, but why

Establishes the Commercial Spaceflight Safety Protocol (CSSP), which mandates that all member nations:

instead of

Mandates that all member nations:

? It just seems an unnecessary complication, and at first glance still looks like you’re making a committee.

Fwiw, in terms of category, I agree that Regulation (probably with Transport as AoE) is a better fit than Advancement of Industry. You’re imposing additional requirements on commercial spacecraft, not freeing up the industry.

[Kaschovia]

OOC: This is of little consequence, but why

Establishes the Commercial Spaceflight Safety Protocol (CSSP), which mandates that all member nations:

instead of

Mandates that all member nations:

? It just seems an unnecessary complication, and at first glance still looks like you’re making a committee.

Fwiw, in terms of category, I agree that Regulation (probably with Transport as AoE) is a better fit than Advancement of Industry. You’re imposing additional requirements on commercial spacecraft, not freeing up the industry.

The use of the CSSP term was more of a roll over from the previous mandate, which was to establish a committee, but I see your point and I will see how I can implement your suggestion.

[Separatist Peoples]

OOC: You should keep an eye on GAR#451 while drafting this.

[Kaschovia]

OOC: You should keep an eye on GAR#451 while drafting this.

OOC: Thank you for bringing GAR #451 to my attention.

[Araraukar]

OOC: Advancement of Industry is a category that has areas of effect instead of strengths. Which AoE is this meant to be in?

OOC: I'm really not quite sure. I feel inclined to change it to Regulation.

OOC: Regulation also has AoEs. The proposal rules thread has categories and AoEs listed and explained.

[Kaschovia]

OOC: I'm really not quite sure. I feel inclined to change it to Regulation.

OOC: Regulation also has AoEs. The proposal rules thread has categories and AoEs listed and explained.

OOC: Ah, I see. I'll make the appropriate changes now. I think the AoE should be Safety.

[Terttia]

Liaise in clause 5 is spelled incorrectly.

[Kenmoria]

“You should have a ‘to’ before ‘maintain’ in the ‘encourages’ clause.”

[Kaschovia]

“You should have a ‘to’ before ‘maintain’ in the ‘encourages’ clause.”

Liaise in clause 5 is spelled incorrectly.

Both fixed.

[Araraukar]

OOC post.

I suggest you drop the blocktext code entirely, because I don't think it works in the submission form. Just use box code to make it stand out here on the forum.

Commercial Spaceflight Safety Act

You don't really need the "Act" at the end.

Aware of the ever-growing commercial spaceflight industries in many WA member states,

You should move the "The World Assembly" from the hereby line to the start of the preamble, so you have something that is aware of all these things. Also, for this particular one, you could drop the "commercial" from there. Preamble clauses don't have effects like active clauses do, so you don't need to title-drop everywhere.

Also aware there are people and organisations that are technologically and financially capable of operating within the sector of commercial spaceflight,

Dropping the commercial from the above clause makes this one make more sense as written, too, as commercial spaceflight then truly becomes a sector of spaceflight industries. However, what does this clause actually say? Is the implication meant to be that only some people and organizations can do that? Are you targeting the ones that can or the ones that can't?

Alarmed at the lack of regulation, given the intricacy and risk to life of spaceflight, especially where untrained passenger clientele are involved, currently surrounding this area of commerce,

Okay, what? I think you mean international regulation, as I can't imagine a space-capable nation that didn't have laws and regulations on the industry. Hell, in IC even Araraukar has them, and it doesn't have any launch sites of its own. (It has a couple of satellites, but they were put into space by some other nation's rockets.) Also, in WA resolutions there is at least the debris prevention resolution, and I would say the workplace safety thing applies to everyone working in commercial spaceflight stuff. As for "untrained passenger clientele" - how do you figure that? In RL, to get anywhere even near space, you need to undergo rigorous training. So just what kind of environment is this resolution aimed at? One where spacetravel is as everyday happening as air travel is in RL? Wouldn't that mean it's also as safe (or even safer) to ever have become that common? And if you're worried about the passengers being untrained yobs, maybe you should focus on them instead of the spaceflights themselves.

Without the intent any intention(s) to limit the promising growth of reusable spaceflight operations and resources in the advancement of safe, sustainable ventures into space,

Slight fix. Not sure of the plural; I'd use it, but it might not be grammatically correct. Also, this clause sounds like desperately trying to fit into something you shouldn't need to worry about fitting it. You could just rephrase it entirely with "Hoping to make spaceflight safer for everyone, while not unnecessarily curbing the existing commercial enterprises,". You can use that wording if you like it.

The World Assembly hereby,

Like I said before, move the "The World Assembly" to the start of everything. (Grammatically it works here, but it looks neater to open the proposal with it.) You should also number the main clauses that come after this. Makes referring to them easier.

Defines commercial spaceflight activity as any action taken by a any persons or organisations in any member nation to conduct international space travel for profit outside of national borders and territories, which may or may not involve passengers,

...so getting a weather forecast would count? (Not safe to send rockets up through thunderstorms.) I get it that you don't want to use "defines commercial spaceflight as spaceflight that's commercial", but you may need to reign it in a bit. Exactly what do you think counts as spaceflight? Where do you draw the limit of "space" anyway? At what point does space become not-air? And for the record, the RL ISS needs to occasionally boost its distance from Earth because of atmospheric drag, and it orbits (according to Wikipedia) at "an average altitude of 400 kilometres (250 miles)", while the RL limit for "Outer Space" starts at 100 kilometres (62 miles).

Mandates that all member nations:

Even the ones with no spaceflight capability or industry?

Determine the minimum safety requirements for the conduction of commercial spaceflight from within their borders to space,

Does that mean they rocket needs to reach space while still within the confines of the nation's borders? Given how quickly at least our RL planet spins, you'd need to be a very big nation to achieve that.

develop an application process for a Commercial Spaceflight License to conduct spaceflights, which shall:

Are the following points for the application process or the licence? You should probably make mandates for the licence and then separately demand nations make them possible to obtain.

Verify the existence of functional, safe launch locations from which the applicant will conduct their spaceflights,

And if none exist within the nation? (Think small island nations, for example.)

verify that all staff at the time of licensing tasked with operating and supervising the spaceflight are adequately certified and fit to do so,

Drop the "at the time of licensing", because that makes it sound that once they've got the licence, they can fire the peeps who know what they're doing, and hire much cheaper non-experts.

and verify that the applicant has the financial and technical capabilities to sustain safe spaceflight ventures,

"Ventures" is unnecessary. Now would be the time for title-dropping. So could reword it as "...to sustain safe commercial spaceflights". Or you could replace ventures (which to me at least evokes images of both the world of financing and Indiana Jones, neither of which are like associations useful for the proposal) with "operations" (which has both military and medical associations, but at least they're more neutral ones in terms of this topic). Also, the inclusion of "sustain" sounds strange. What if the licence is asked for a single launch of a satellite? Why must they be able to sustain anything if they want just a single launch? Or can they do prototype testing (non-manned, likely not safe) without a licence, first? You may need to re-think this a bit, or make a separate licence for testing period, before passengers or useful payloads are intended to be included.

Which reminds me, is this whole thing aimed only at passenger transport? Your preamble seems to suggest so, though your definition doesn't agree. Much of RL commercial spaceflight stuff is putting satellites in orbit.

issue the Commercial Spaceflight License and keep a safe record of all successful applicants,

If they're successful in the application, they're no longer applicants but licence holders, instead. So I'd instead mandate up-to-date records of being kept of all licence holders, with some kind of addition of how the licenced peeps are responsible for keeping the records up-to-date, rather than the nation.

establish an action protocol for any and all emergencies that might occur during spaceflight, covering ground-to-space communications, emergency reentry and landing procedures, and passenger safety,

...is this mandate still for the nations or the licence holders? What if the nation itself has no space capabilities and are just letting a commercial enterprize to use their turf as launch site, because they happen to be at or near the equator? And now you're again veering into passenger transport only, given that that is an and-list, which means they all must be applied. Also, if this about interplanetary (or even interstellar) spacetravel, or even just international, why is the nation sending the spacecraft off, responsible for communications between it and ground when it's above/around entirely different nation/planet/star? If in RL we had a Mars colony, and there were flights between Earth and Mars, it'd make much more sense for the spacecraft to communicate with Mars when closer to that planet, than Earth, and vice versa. Not even touching the issue of interstellar travel, because that'd make it much more absurd.

and liaise with the International Aero-Space Administration on matters of mutual interest such as commercial spaceflight cooperation.

If you're referring to an existing committee, then doesn't that mean the preamble is just outright lying of there not being anything out there that regulates spaceflight? Also, cooperation between what?

Prohibits any person or organization in any member nation from conducting commercial spaceflight activities without a Commercial Spaceflight License issued by their government in accordance with the mandates of this resolution,

Their nation (also, use "state" or "nation" instead of "government") or the nation they operate in? Because otherwise you're creating a situation where organizations could buy a licence from a nation that doesn't do spaceflights itself (like Araraukar) and thus isn't very concerned about them getting everything right (though given Araraukar is bureaucracy-driven, that's unlikely to be the case there), and then go conduct their activity in some other nation that might have very vested interest in them not blowing up rockets full of people on their turf.

Encourages member states to maintain a register of commercial spaceflights to be state-sanctioned and launched within their borders for better bookkeeping and historical purposes,

...what? This looks like three clauses were smushed together and someone forgot to take it through the "does this even make sense" sieve. The whole licencing thing is intended to make it so that each launch does not need to be separately state-sanctioned, and the "launched within their borders" bit just magically appeared there from somewhere. I think the words "to be" are the ones creating the confusion here. If it read "that are", then it'd make more sense, though I'm not sure why bookkeeping and historical purposes need to be invoked. And rather than register, I'd make it a database instead. And make it a mandate, too.

Confirms the right of member states to prohibit commercial space activity within their borders,

...but they still must make a licencing program for it?

Urges member states to, even if in opposition to the advancement of the space industry, become more aware of and familiar with the regular space activities of other nations, to avoid public panic, misidentification of flying objects by foreign militaries, or fear-driven action against sanctioned space activity.

Is this a sneaky RL reference to how Soviet space capsules actually had the text "do not be afraid, there are humans inside this", after some farmers had thought it was alien invasion when one landed on their field and reacted badly? Also, you're urging the states (that's the organization that is the nation, not the people of the nation) to become more familiar with space travel. Not sure how that'd prevent any of the negative effects listed there.

[Kaschovia]

OOC post.

I suggest you drop the blocktext code entirely, because I don't think it works in the submission form. Just use box code to make it stand out here on the forum.

Yeah, when it is submitted I will drop it.

Commercial Spaceflight Safety Act

You don't really need the "Act" at the end.

Removed.

Aware of the ever-growing commercial spaceflight industries in many WA member states,

You should move the "The World Assembly" from the hereby line to the start of the preamble, so you have something that is aware of all these things. Also, for this particular one, you could drop the "commercial" from there. Preamble clauses don't have effects like active clauses do, so you don't need to title-drop everywhere.

"The World Assembly" moved and "commercial" removed.

Also aware there are people and organisations that are technologically and financially capable of operating within the sector of commercial spaceflight,

Dropping the commercial from the above clause makes this one make more sense as written, too, as commercial spaceflight then truly becomes a sector of spaceflight industries. However, what does this clause actually say? Is the implication meant to be that only some people and organizations can do that? Are you targeting the ones that can or the ones that can't?

I've removed "commercial" here as well.

The resolution targets both groups. It's purpose is to create guidelines around safe space travel operations, primarily involving paying clientele. The clause specifically address the truth of the situation in the spaceflight industries of member nations, that there are people and organisations that have the capability to operate within the industry. It is, in effect, a 'because these people can do this', and 'because others may want to do this...'

Alarmed at the lack of regulation, given the intricacy and risk to life of spaceflight, especially where untrained passenger clientele are involved, currently surrounding this area of commerce,

Okay, what? I think you mean international regulation, as I can't imagine a space-capable nation that didn't have laws and regulations on the industry. Hell, in IC even Araraukar has them, and it doesn't have any launch sites of its own. (It has a couple of satellites, but they were put into space by some other nation's rockets.) Also, in WA resolutions there is at least the debris prevention resolution, and I would say the workplace safety thing applies to everyone working in commercial spaceflight stuff. As for "untrained passenger clientele" - how do you figure that? In RL, to get anywhere even near space, you need to undergo rigorous training. So just what kind of environment is this resolution aimed at? One where spacetravel is as everyday happening as air travel is in RL? Wouldn't that mean it's also as safe (or even safer) to ever have become that common? And if you're worried about the passengers being untrained yobs, maybe you should focus on them instead of the spaceflights themselves.

I've added "international" before "regulation".

Yes, spaceflight staff might be trained in Araraukar, but this clause does not refer to trained staff. It refers to the passengers of spaceflight which are not trained, implying there is a vulnerability there in a life that is in danger if there are no safety regulations.

Without the intent any intention(s) to limit the promising growth of reusable spaceflight operations and resources in the advancement of safe, sustainable ventures into space,

Slight fix. Not sure of the plural; I'd use it, but it might not be grammatically correct. Also, this clause sounds like desperately trying to fit into something you shouldn't need to worry about fitting it. You could just rephrase it entirely with "Hoping to make spaceflight safer for everyone, while not unnecessarily curbing the existing commercial enterprises,". You can use that wording if you like it.

I've changed it to your wording.

The World Assembly hereby,

Like I said before, move the "The World Assembly" to the start of everything. (Grammatically it works here, but it looks neater to open the proposal with it.) You should also number the main clauses that come after this. Makes referring to them easier.

Fixed. Numbers also added.

Defines commercial spaceflight activity as any action taken by a any persons or organisations in any member nation to conduct international space travel for profit outside of national borders and territories, which may or may not involve passengers,

...so getting a weather forecast would count? (Not safe to send rockets up through thunderstorms.) I get it that you don't want to use "defines commercial spaceflight as spaceflight that's commercial", but you may need to reign it in a bit. Exactly what do you think counts as spaceflight? Where do you draw the limit of "space" anyway? At what point does space become not-air? And for the record, the RL ISS needs to occasionally boost its distance from Earth because of atmospheric drag, and it orbits (according to Wikipedia) at "an average altitude of 400 kilometres (250 miles)", while the RL limit for "Outer Space" starts at 100 kilometres (62 miles).

This clause was a tough one. The resolution aims to ensure that all commercial spaceflight is done so safely and with risk minimised to the greatest extent. Perhaps I could include some reference to wherever there may be risk to human safety, or remove "may not" so only spaceflight where passengers are at risk in terms of safety should be considered by the resolution, but then again that would undermine the purpose of the definition. Any ideas?

Mandates that all member nations:

Even the ones with no spaceflight capability or industry?

I've changed it to "all member nations with ongoing commercial spaceflight activities:", so as soon as any nation commences commercial spaceflight activities, these mandates are kicked into effect. Does that work?

Determine the minimum safety requirements for the conduction of commercial spaceflight from within their borders to space,

Does that mean they rocket needs to reach space while still within the confines of the nation's borders? Given how quickly at least our RL planet spins, you'd need to be a very big nation to achieve that.

No. From within their borders to space. So it starts from within their borders, and they go to space. That clause is more about specifying for nations that have massive space empires, that every location they launch spaceflights is effected by the mandate.

develop an application process for a Commercial Spaceflight License to conduct spaceflights, which shall:

Are the following points for the application process or the licence? You should probably make mandates for the licence and then separately demand nations make them possible to obtain.

2.b.i, ii, and iii all refer to what the application needs to review before 2.c is enacted, so they're already separate.

Verify the existence of functional, safe launch locations from which the applicant will conduct their spaceflights,

And if none exist within the nation? (Think small island nations, for example.)

How would they have already established spaceflight operations if there weren't locations already from which to launch? And if there were, but they weren't safe enough due to the size of the nation, then they would not be given a license as it is not safe.

verify that all staff at the time of licensing tasked with operating and supervising the spaceflight are adequately certified and fit to do so,

Drop the "at the time of licensing", because that makes it sound that once they've got the licence, they can fire the peeps who know what they're doing, and hire much cheaper non-experts.

Good point. Fixed.

and verify that the applicant has the financial and technical capabilities to sustain safe spaceflight ventures,

"Ventures" is unnecessary. Now would be the time for title-dropping. So could reword it as "...to sustain safe commercial spaceflights". Or you could replace ventures (which to me at least evokes images of both the world of financing and Indiana Jones, neither of which are like associations useful for the proposal) with "operations" (which has both military and medical associations, but at least they're more neutral ones in terms of this topic). Also, the inclusion of "sustain" sounds strange. What if the licence is asked for a single launch of a satellite? Why must they be able to sustain anything if they want just a single launch? Or can they do prototype testing (non-manned, likely not safe) without a licence, first? You may need to re-think this a bit, or make a separate licence for testing period, before passengers or useful payloads are intended to be included.

Which reminds me, is this whole thing aimed only at passenger transport? Your preamble seems to suggest so, though your definition doesn't agree. Much of RL commercial spaceflight stuff is putting satellites in orbit.

"Ventures" replaced with "commercial spaceflight operations" and "sustain" replaced with "conduct".

This is the tough part, because there are still safety risks where non-human space operations are concerned such as satellites, but really what I am trying to establish is a set of regulations which say that spaceflight operations are conducted in a manner that prioritizes safety in general, with risks to humans heavily considered as well.

issue the Commercial Spaceflight License and keep a safe record of all successful applicants,

If they're successful in the application, they're no longer applicants but licence holders, instead. So I'd instead mandate up-to-date records of being kept of all licence holders, with some kind of addition of how the licenced peeps are responsible for keeping the records up-to-date, rather than the nation.

Good idea. Fixed.

Changed to "issue the Commercial Spaceflight License, keep a safe record of all successful license holders, and ensure the license holder maintains their own records thereafter,"

establish an action protocol for any and all emergencies that might occur during spaceflight, covering ground-to-space communications, emergency reentry and landing procedures, and passenger safety,

...is this mandate still for the nations or the licence holders? What if the nation itself has no space capabilities and are just letting a commercial enterprize to use their turf as launch site, because they happen to be at or near the equator? And now you're again veering into passenger transport only, given that that is an and-list, which means they all must be applied. Also, if this about interplanetary (or even interstellar) spacetravel, or even just international, why is the nation sending the spacecraft off, responsible for communications between it and ground when it's above/around entirely different nation/planet/star? If in RL we had a Mars colony, and there were flights between Earth and Mars, it'd make much more sense for the spacecraft to communicate with Mars when closer to that planet, than Earth, and vice versa. Not even touching the issue of interstellar travel, because that'd make it much more absurd.

So what I have done to solve this, I hope, is make the license holder responsible for communication with their spaceflight operation, by adding the clause "and verify that the applicant has the means to maintain communications with their spaceflight operations in case of emergencies,". So the burden is not on the nation, but on the license holder, assuming that the license holder, if they were capable of interstellar travel, would have bases at their location to maintain communications.

and liaise with the International Aero-Space Administration on matters of mutual interest such as commercial spaceflight cooperation.

If you're referring to an existing committee, then doesn't that mean the preamble is just outright lying of there not being anything out there that regulates spaceflight? Also, cooperation between what?

Completely unintentional mistake. The preamble wording is more to emphasize that there isn't extensive and focused legislation on commercial spaceflight safety. I'll change the preamble to reflect this.

Prohibits any person or organization in any member nation from conducting commercial spaceflight activities without a Commercial Spaceflight License issued by their government in accordance with the mandates of this resolution,

Their nation (also, use "state" or "nation" instead of "government") or the nation they operate in? Because otherwise you're creating a situation where organizations could buy a licence from a nation that doesn't do spaceflights itself (like Araraukar) and thus isn't very concerned about them getting everything right (though given Araraukar is bureaucracy-driven, that's unlikely to be the case there), and then go conduct their activity in some other nation that might have very vested interest in them not blowing up rockets full of people on their turf.

Nice observation.

I've changed it so that they must be issued a license by the state they operate in.

Encourages member states to maintain a register of commercial spaceflights to be state-sanctioned and launched within their borders for better bookkeeping and historical purposes,

...what? This looks like three clauses were smushed together and someone forgot to take it through the "does this even make sense" sieve. The whole licencing thing is intended to make it so that each launch does not need to be separately state-sanctioned, and the "launched within their borders" bit just magically appeared there from somewhere. I think the words "to be" are the ones creating the confusion here. If it read "that are", then it'd make more sense, though I'm not sure why bookkeeping and historical purposes need to be invoked. And rather than register, I'd make it a database instead. And make it a mandate, too.

Ouch.

I've made the changes you've suggested.

Confirms the right of member states to prohibit commercial space activity within their borders,

...but they still must make a licencing program for it?

If they prohibit all spaceflight activity, then the mandates would no longer apply as there are no ongoing spaceflight activites anymore, so they wouldn't need to make a licensing program.

Urges member nations to, even if in opposition to the advancement of the space industry, become more aware of and familiar with the regular space activities of other nations, to avoid public panic, misidentification of flying objects by foreign militaries, or fear-driven action against sanctioned space activity.

Is this a sneaky RL reference to how Soviet space capsules actually had the text "do not be afraid, there are humans inside this", after some farmers had thought it was alien invasion when one landed on their field and reacted badly? Also, you're urging the states (that's the organization that is the nation, not the people of the nation) to become more familiar with space travel. Not sure how that'd prevent any of the negative effects listed there.

I've added a few words there to ensure that the nation helps make their population become more aware of spaceflight activity. And it would prevent the negative effects listed because there would be more understanding of what is going on, so less confusion.

[Kaschovia]

I think this draft is coming along well, but I know there is still some things I might need to clear up. Does anyone else have any thoughts or suggestions?

[Araraukar]

OOC post. (EDIT: I realize I'm not "anyone else", but I have newer comments to make. )

Category: Regulation | AoE: Safety

Transportation would likely be a better AoE.

Aware of the ever-growing spaceflight industries in many WA member states,

Use "member nations". State is the organization of a nation, not the nation in its entirety. Also, I'd use singular of "industry".

Also aware there are people and organisations that are technologically and financially capable of operating within the sector of spaceflight,

"Sector of spaceflight" doesn't make sense.

Alarmed at the lack of extensive international regulation, given the intricacy and risk to life of both passengers and crew in nascent commercial spaceflight industry especially where untrained passenger clientele are involved, currently surrounding this area of commerce,

You don't want to go around saying spaceflight is always dangerous, given the robust FT community in NS, hence addition of "nascent", which basically means "starting out", which is where RL is at, about. Also, the strike-outs are really just making it sound more complicated without adding anything to it.

Hoping to make spaceflight safer for everyone, while not unnecessarily curbing the existing commercial enterprises by introducing common safety measures,

Given that you are unnecessarily curbing existing spaceflight enterprises, it's best to not set yourself up as a liar. The added bit is a better excuse for introducing new regulations.

1. Defines commercial spaceflight activity as any action taken by any persons or organisation in any member nation to conduct international space travel for profit outside of national borders and territories, which may or may not involve passengers,

What's this? Is it international space travel if you take off and land in the same nation, but your flightpath both into and from space takes you through international or other nations' airspace? Also, if the planet is a single nation and lays claim to the whole solar system (despite not existing beyond the planetary orbit, like us in RL currently), does any spaceflight they're capable of, in-system, count for this?

2.a. Determine the minimum safety requirements for the conduction of commercial spaceflight from within their borders to space,

So which part of this makes it international?

develop an application process for a Commercial Spaceflight License to conduct spaceflights, which shall:

No reason to capitalize the words of the licence. Also, the nations should create the concept of the licence first, and that should include the bits below, and only after that create an application process. Right now is sounds like the application process should have all of the below, while it should be the licence itself.

verify that all staff tasked with operating and supervising the spaceflight spacecraft and related equipment are adequately certified and fit to do so,

Should be obvious.

verify that the applicant has the financial and technical capabilities to conduct safe spaceflight operations,

Stick to what you've defined and use "commercial spaceflight activities". Here and everywhere that you currently use "spaceflight operations". Or change the defined wording.

and verify that the applicant has the means to maintain enable communications with their spaceflight operations spacecraft in case of an emergency,

Should be obvious.

issue the Commercial Spaceflight License, keep a safe record of all successful license holders, and ensure the each license holder maintains keeps their own records information on record up to date thereafter,

Should be equally obvious.

and liaise with the International Aero-Space Administration on matters of mutual interest such as commercial spaceflight cooperation.

I think liaising with their neighbouring nations would be more important, and also the "mutual interest" doesn't work when a committee is the other side. It'd work with the neighbouring countries, though.

3. Prohibits any person or organization in any member nation from conducting commercial spaceflight activities without a Commercial Spaceflight License issued by the state they operate in corresponding with the mandates of this resolution,

Licence words don't need to be capitalized, and given that you're defining what the licence has, the struck-out bit is given and doesn't need to be said.

4. Mandates member states to maintain a database of commercial spaceflights that are state-sanctioned and launched within their borders for better bookkeeping and historical purposes,

...this, why is this here again? At the very least remove the struck out bits.

5. Confirms the right of member states to prohibit commercial space activity within their borders,

This should perhaps be moved to the beginning, right after definition.

6. Urges member states to, even if in opposition to the advancement of the space industry, help the public become more aware of and familiar with the regular space activities of other nations, to avoid public panic or confusion, misidentification of flying objects by foreign militaries their military, or fear-driven action against sanctioned licenced space activity.

Should be obvious.

[Kaschovia]

OOC post. (EDIT: I realize I'm not "anyone else", but I have newer comments to make. )

Your comments are always appreciated. I can always rely on a good roast from Ara

Category: Regulation | AoE: Safety

Transportation would likely be a better AoE.

Changed.

Aware of the ever-growing spaceflight industries in many WA member states,

Use "member nations". State is the organization of a nation, not the nation in its entirety. Also, I'd use singular of "industry".

Both suggestions added.

Also aware there are people and organisations that are technologically and financially capable of operating within the sector of spaceflight,

"Sector of spaceflight" doesn't make sense.

Changed.

Alarmed at the lack of extensive international regulation, given the intricacy and risk to life of both passengers and crew in nascent commercial spaceflight industry especially where untrained passenger clientele are involved, currently surrounding this area of commerce,

You don't want to go around saying spaceflight is always dangerous, given the robust FT community in NS, hence addition of "nascent", which basically means "starting out", which is where RL is at, about. Also, the strike-outs are really just making it sound more complicated without adding anything to it.

Edits added.

Hoping to make spaceflight safer for everyone, while not unnecessarily curbing the existing commercial enterprises by introducing common safety measures,

Given that you are unnecessarily curbing existing spaceflight enterprises, it's best to not set yourself up as a liar. The added bit is a better excuse for introducing new regulations.

Added.

1. Defines commercial spaceflight activity as any action taken by any persons or organisation in any member nation to conduct international space travel for profit outside of national borders and territories, which may or may not involve passengers,

What's this? Is it international space travel if you take off and land in the same nation, but your flightpath both into and from space takes you through international or other nations' airspace? Also, if the planet is a single nation and lays claim to the whole solar system (despite not existing beyond the planetary orbit, like us in RL currently), does any spaceflight they're capable of, in-system, count for this?

It's a tough one. On one hand there is the existence of these nations with territorial claims to their entire solar system, but I think it is fair to say that all nations understand what space is. Do you suggest I remove the word international, as space is generally intrnational in nature in the physical sense?

2.a. Determine the minimum safety requirements for the conduction of commercial spaceflight from within their borders to space,

So which part of this makes it international?

'from within their borders to space.' As I said above, space is generally considered international territory on the grand physical scale of things.

develop an application process for a Commercial Spaceflight License to conduct spaceflights, which shall:

No reason to capitalize the words of the licence. Also, the nations should create the concept of the licence first, and that should include the bits below, and only after that create an application process. Right now is sounds like the application process should have all of the below, while it should be the licence itself.

All fixed and the suggestion added.

verify that all staff tasked with operating and supervising the spaceflight spacecraft and related equipment are adequately certified and fit to do so,

Should be obvious.

Changed.

verify that the applicant has the financial and technical capabilities to conduct safe spaceflight operations,

Stick to what you've defined and use "commercial spaceflight activities". Here and everywhere that you currently use "spaceflight operations". Or change the defined wording.

Changed.

and verify that the applicant has the means to maintain enable communications with their spaceflight operations spacecraft in case of an emergency,

Should be obvious.

Changed.

issue the Commercial Spaceflight License, keep a safe record of all successful license holders, and ensure the each license holder maintains keeps their own records information on record up to date thereafter,

Should be equally obvious.

Changed.

and liaise with the International Aero-Space Administration on matters of mutual interest such as commercial spaceflight cooperation.

I think liaising with their neighbouring nations would be more important, and also the "mutual interest" doesn't work when a committee is the other side. It'd work with the neighbouring countries, though.

Changed.

3. Prohibits any person or organization in any member nation from conducting commercial spaceflight activities without a Commercial Spaceflight License issued by the state they operate in corresponding with the mandates of this resolution,

Licence words don't need to be capitalized, and given that you're defining what the licence has, the struck-out bit is given and doesn't need to be said.

Changed.

4. Mandates member states to maintain a database of commercial spaceflights that are state-sanctioned and launched within their borders for better bookkeeping and historical purposes,

...this, why is this here again? At the very least remove the struck out bits.

Edited. It is not a duplicate. The clause in the license section mandates keeping a record of all license holders. This part mandates keeping a database of spaceflights launched within their borders.

5. Confirms the right of member states to prohibit commercial space activity within their borders,

This should perhaps be moved to the beginning, right after definition.

Done.

6. Urges member states to, even if in opposition to the advancement of the space industry, help the public become more aware of and familiar with the regular space activities of other nations, to avoid public panic or confusion, misidentification of flying objects by foreign militaries their military, or fear-driven action against sanctioned licenced space activity.

Should be obvious.

Done.

[Imperium Anglorum]

There's no need to capitalise unnecessarily. Put "and" where needed. Use semicolons. I realised that doing markup in bbCode is a pain and did it in Preview instead.

[Sierra Lyricalia]

Leo rises to address the drafting delegation. "Ambassador, 'conduction' (which you use in clause 3(a)) is a term of art relating to the flow of electricity through a substance or medium. I think you want the word 'operation' or something similar in that spot. And frankly 'commercial spaceflight from within their borders to space' is not a poetic turn of phrase. You should either tease out everything you mean, or else simply remove some words. My intern is passing around a sheet with two examples of better construction."

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a. Determine the minimum safety requirements for the conduction of commercial spaceflight from within their borders to space,

or

a. Determine the minimum safety requirements for licensed conduction operation of commercial spaceflights from within their borders to space to or from space, including momentary suborbital trips,

[Kaschovia]

There's no need to capitalise unnecessarily. Put "and" where needed. Use semicolons. I realised that doing markup in bbCode is a pain and did it in Preview instead.

(Image)

Changes made.

Leo rises to address the drafting delegation. "Ambassador, 'conduction' (which you use in clause 3(a)) is a term of art relating to the flow of electricity through a substance or medium. I think you want the word 'operation' or something similar in that spot. And frankly 'commercial spaceflight from within their borders to space' is not a poetic turn of phrase. You should either tease out everything you mean, or else simply remove some words. My intern is passing around a sheet with two examples of better construction."

---

a. Determine the minimum safety requirements for the conduction of commercial spaceflight from within their borders to space,

or

a. Determine the minimum safety requirements for licensed conduction operation of commercial spaceflights from within their borders to space to or from space, including momentary suborbital trips,

I've opted for the second amendment. Edit made.