lawyer physics (was taxing satellites)

[David Honig]

At 12:44 AM 7/11/01 -0400, Jim Windle wrote:
>There is lots of junk up there.  Schemes to de-orbit satellites at the end
of their useful life have been put forward but they always fail on the
liability issue.  Apparently if a satellite falls out of orbit it is an
"act of god" and the owner/insurer is not responsible for damages, but if
the satellite is deliberately de-orbitted the owner/insurer is on the hook.
 No one, 

More importantly: you can't get sued if your space debris trashes someone
else's 
mission.

So why bother?