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NASA To Future Lunar Explorers: Don't Mess With Our Moon Stuff
coondoggie writes "NASA today gently reminded any future Moon explorers that any relics of its Apollo missions or other U.S. lunar artifacts should be off limits and are considered historic sites. NASA issued the reminder in conjunction with the X Prize Foundation and its Google Lunar X Prize competition which will use NASA's Moon sites guidelines as it sifts through the 26 teams currently developing systems and spacecraft to land on the Moon."
not true, Russia put stuff up there.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luna_2
Looks like it's not just the USSR and the USA either --
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_artificial_objects_on_the_Moon
Looks like there's stuff up there from the USSR, USA, Japan, China, India and the European Space Agency (18 nations combined.)
Having done a lot of research in space law, I'd like to dispel some of the misconceptions I see being put forth in both the summary and the comments:
1. These are not rules but rather guidelines and are only directly binding on activities conducted by NASA itself.
2. However, they are likely to become de facto conditions for any activities licensed, fully or in part, by the U.S. government or other friendly spacefaring nations. At the present, this covers basically all private space activity.
3. Under the Outer Space Treaty, to which all spacefaring nations are parties, all man-made items on the surface of the moon and other celestial bodies, as well as in orbit, continue to belong to the nations that launched them (with the possible exception of a couple of Soviet landers allegedly sold to Lord British). This policy exists to ensure that launching entities may not absolve themselves of responsibility for damage cause by their objects, on earth or in space, after their use life is over.
4. Space law does not contain notions of salvage as does maritime law. "lost" or otherwise inaccessible objects may not be removed without their owners' permission.
5. It is the U.S. government's position that the lunar landing sites remain active research laboratories studying the long-term effects of the lunar environment on man-made objects. This provides them further protections from non-interference under various space law treaties.
6. None of the other spacefaring nations, China included, are interested in disturbing these sites due to the huge negative backlash they would incur.
7. No substantive laws forbidding people form messing with these sites exist. Many have advocated extending UNESCO World Heritage Site status to the lunar landing sites, but that regime is premised on territorial sovereignty, which cannot exist in space under the OST. Under the property principles outlined above, however, the owners of space objects (here the U.S. govt.) could sue any private party that succeeded in screwing with the landing sites into the ground.