From the mounting threat of space debris to the rise of commercial space tourism, Samantha Pacchiarotta has revealed the complex legal challenges emerging alongside Australia’s rapidly growing space industry.
Speaking on a recent episode of The Lawyers Weekly Show, Samantha Pacchiarotta, an associate at Bartier Perry, outlined some of the headline legal challenges and complex questions that remain unresolved in Australia’s rapidly evolving space industry, a sector still full of unknowns as it grows and changes.
In the same episode, she delved deep into Australia’s rapidly expanding space law sector, examining its current landscape, its accelerated growth, and the opportunities that lie ahead in this emerging area of law.
Pacchiarotta pointed out that one of the space sector’s most pressing challenges is the skyrocketing accumulation of so-called “space junk”, re-entering the atmosphere and crowding low-Earth orbit at an unprecedented rate.
“One of the main legal issues in the space industry is that low-Earth orbit is becoming increasingly crowded with space junk. In 2024, NASA reported more than 2,000 pieces of space junk had re-entered the Earth’s atmosphere,” she said.
She highlighted that much of the space debris cluttering Earth’s orbit consists of defunct satellites and fragments from collisions, creating escalating risks for both our planet and outer space.
“When we talk about space junk, we mean all man-made objects, including the smallest fragments that are no longer functional and exist in Earth orbit or re-enter the atmosphere,” she said.
“For example, satellites that have reached the end of life and have been left in orbit or end their fragmentation from collisions.
“The concern is with space debris. It poses such significant risks both on Earth and in outer space. Even the smallest particles can inflict heavy damage and injury due to their high velocities.”
Similarly, Pacchiarotta highlighted just how widespread and urgent the problem has become, citing recent data from the European Space Agency.
“The ESA reported this year that intact space objects are now falling back to Earth more than three times a day. It was only just the other day that there was some space debris found in a mining town in WA, which is believed to be from a Chinese rocket,” she said.
However, Pacchiarotta noted that incidents like these are now prompting difficult legal questions – chief among them: “Who is responsible for damage caused by space junk?”
Adding to the complexity of the space law landscape, Pacchiarotta said another major challenge lies in the rapid rise of commercial space travel.
“With the rise of commercial space travel, travelling to space is becoming a real option for tourists, with companies such as Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin and SpaceX now offering paid trips into space,” she said.
While the prospect of space tourism is thrilling and brimming with possibility, Pacchiarotta noted that it opens the door to entirely uncharted legal territory – forcing regulators and lawyers to confront questions the current legal framework was never designed to answer.
“But space tourism gives rise to a number of novel questions which we are still working out. So things like who is responsible? The country that registers the spacecraft has legal jurisdiction. But things can get messy if something goes wrong, especially if someone becomes incapacitated or dies during the trip,” she said.
