Legal Aspects of Military Sonic Booms

Sonic booms from aircraft are a relatively recent phenomena. However, the law has developed to meet the new challenges and old rules of liability have been modified to fit the changed conditions. The following paper is an attempt to show some of the legal developments which have resulted from military supersonic flight, since only military or government type aircraft have flown supersonically in the United States to date. Various theories of liability for sonic boom damages have been considered by the courts and these are set forth in this article for comparison purposes. From a review of these decisions, we may be able to anticipate how future courts will handle similar problems.