8 Weird Questions That Courts Have Legally Answered
3. Who Owns The Sky?
The question "who owns the sky?" sounds like it wouldn't have a real answer (except maybe dragons). But a 1946 U.S. Supreme Court case actually addressed the issue definitively.
Prior to United States v. Causby, common law recognized a concept called ad coelum. It basically stated that if you owned land, you owned everything above that land, infinitely upward. So if you purchased a nice little acre of property in the country, congratulations! You now own part of the Andromeda galaxy.
Ad coelum was the basis under which Thomas Causby sued the U.S. government in 1946. During World War II, the military used an airstrip less than a mile away from Causby's chicken farm, sometimes flying planes so low above his land that his chickens literally started killing themselves.
Causby claimed that because of ad coelum, he owned the sky above his farm and demanded compensation. The government claimed the 1926 Air Commerce Act granted them ownership over all airspace.
The Supreme Court's ruling was somewhat of a compromise: a person does own the space above his land, but only "the lower altitude airspace." Sorry if you were already making plans for all that Andromeda property.
Verdict: Nobody owns the entire sky. Except maybe dragons.