400
The Green Bag
of the landowner's rights in the air above is not an easy one. The most reasonable position seems to be that the landowner's rights extend into the air above his holdings, but only as far as his practical interests demand, as far as he is able and willing to use the air
and hence to reserve it for his own use. Higher than this he can lay no claim;
his right of possession is at an end. Below this very vague and variable limit the air is his, and strange flyers
are dependent on his permission. Up to the present time the most difli cult and doubtful legal questions in connection with aviation have been brought to light by suits for damages
caused by flights or landings.
I will
balloon began to collapse from loss of gas. The pilot, seeing himself forced to land, chose for the purpose an open space beyond the town. As he fiew just above the roofs of the houses, with his ropes dragging in the streets, the inhabit ants, supposing that he wished to be drawn down, seized the ropes. The aeronaut cried to them to release him; his cries were not understood, were
assumed to be cries for help, and the townsmen pulled the balloon to the earth. The pilot was forced to open his valve to release the gas. In the second story of a house in the narrow street a man was smoking; his cigarette
ignited the escaping gas, and there was
cite three cases in which decisions have been rendered: On the 3d of April, 1910,
an explosion, with dead, wounded and destruction of property. The Court condemned the aeronaut to pay all dam
the balloon Pomerania came in con
ages, because he was held responsible
tact near Stettin with a government telegraph line and broke the wires, then
for the accident. The circumstances force us to call the aviator to account for damages and
bounded back against a factory build ing and tore down a chimney. The wind which was raging then drove the balloon out over the sea, where its inmates, Dr. Delbriick and two com
panions, were killed. Who was liable for the damage to the telegraph wires and the chimney? Again: On a meadow near Frankfurt a balloon was forced to land because its gas supply gave out. The inhabitants of the neighboring vil
lage swarmed out curiously to the scene of the accident, and in so doing trampled a vegetable garden to ruin. The owner brought suit against the aéronaut for the injury to his vegetables. The aero naut replied: “I did no damage; I was a
long distance away fr'om your garden." The court, nevertheless, awarded the
vegetable dealer his damages. A very remarkable case was brought up in the Belgian Chamber of .Deputies in June, 1909, by the Minister of Justice, Lant sheere. Near a certain small town a
not trialleave proprietor. the burden Weon arethe practically injured terres~ help less against the dangers which threaten us from these inaccessible vehicles of unknown ownership. We cannot guard against them and we cannot escape them. The aviator has brought new
perils into the world; and yet he is demanding that his fellow-man be laden with new obligations for his convenience. Thus he asks, for example, that all struc tures which are more than 150 feet high be lighted all night with a lantern, and
that aéronauts in danger be allowed to fly and to land wherever circumstances demand. However the laws of a particular country may regulate the matter, no one state can find an adequate solution of the problem. In order to settle the
question of the securing of restitution in a fair and adequate manner,
I have
proposed an international juristic-com
