Ned Potter is the science correspondent for ABC's "World News with Charles Gibson." He has reported on such topics as space exploration, the human genome and climate change.
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Guns in Space
February 21, 2007 12:38 PM
Please stow your phasers in your utility belts before liftoff. This post comes from Brian Hartman of our Washington bureau:
After tripping into a constitutional gun rights controversy, the FAA has amended a rule that bans carrying guns on commercial space ships. 
In writing a rule that bans "any explosives, firearms, knives or other weapons" aboard commercial spacecraft, the FAA cited the Second Amendment as granting "a collective right'' to keep and bear arms.
That didn't sit too well with conservatives or gun rights advocates who believe the right to bear arms in outer space rests with INDIVIDUALS -- not the collective community as a whole. They saw the FAA's language as a Bush administration endorsement of a too-restrictive gun rights philosophy.
So the Justice Department reminded the FAA that the Bush administration's official position is that the right to keep and bear arms is an individual -- NOT a collective right. Thus has the FAA rewritten its rule.
But rest assured, future space travelers, your fellow passengers will be unarmed regardless of their constitutional philosophy:
"The FAA continues to believe that the possession of weapons by space flight participants on board a suborbital rocket poses an unacceptably high risk to the integrity of the vehicle and the safety of the public, and that the rule is consistent with the Second Amendment."
(Image courtesy: The Kobal Collection/WireImage.com)
February 21, 2007 | Permalink | Share | User Comments (7)
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Set phasers on "stupid." So the FAA is already worrying about future commercial spaceflights which are years, if not decades, in the future while JetBlue passengers have to wait on the tarmac for hours on end before taking off (if they ever do)? Methinks the FAA has too much to do now before attempting to regulate something which hasn't yet happened!
Posted by: chuck | Feb 21, 2007 1:55:03 PM
In the 9/11/2001 hijackings, if a few passengers had been allowed to carry their phasers placed on stun, possibly there would not have been any hijacking!
Posted by: tmblweed | Feb 21, 2007 3:28:43 PM
I guess the FAA is right. It's not good policy to allow passengers to run around a spacecraft armed and dangerous. A stray shot could cause some interesting results. Of course, the same idea applies to aircraft flying above 15000 feet, or so. Explosive decompression is not a pretty sight. In a spacecraft, trying to get to breathable atmosphere is problematical at best.
Posted by: Andy | Feb 21, 2007 3:52:46 PM
There aren't many commercial spacecrafts to worry about and if there are any commercial spacecraft in the future, I think that the guards would check the passengers for any weapons they had on them.
Posted by: No Name | Feb 21, 2007 6:20:17 PM
This is Nut's
Posted by: Logan Burrus | Feb 22, 2007 8:59:37 AM
1. The FAA has neither authority nor the justification for this rule.
2. Unacceptably high risk? No kidding.
3. Does this new rule mean the spacecraft can’t have tools onboard because they could be used as weapons?
4. Oh wait...commercial space flights do not exist yet.
5. The FAA doesn’t have enough to do so they have to create meaningless rules on craft that don’t exist.
6. Another example of our tax dollars hard at work. Not!
Posted by: JJ | Feb 22, 2007 11:33:54 AM
I definaetly agree with No Name and JJ
Posted by: weird | Mar 3, 2007 3:35:31 PM
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