Salvage rights

--- In ssi_list@... "Ed Minchau"
> > Hey, now that NASA has decided to abandon the Hubble telescope,
> does that
> > make it fair game for the first guys to get up there and grab
it?
> I mean, even
> > after 15 years of depreciation, it's still gotta be worth half a
> billion, at
> > least. Seems like a great opportunity for somebody...
>
> As long as Hubble is still functional, nobody else but NASA can
> legally touch it. However, it is down to 3 operational gyroscopes
> out of six, so once two more fail it becomes junk. Space junk
falls
> under the laws of salvage; if you can acquire it, then it is yours.
>
> There is a lot more junk up there, some of it orbiting for decades
> already, from dead GEO satellites to spent Apollo stages. Notice
> the competition between various space agencies and private
industry
> to salvage this stuff? None.
>
> Ed