§2281a Additional offenses against maritime fixed platforms

Summary

Makes it a crime to use, try to use, or threaten to use powerful weapons or to release dangerous substances from a permanent sea platform when the act is meant to scare people or force a government or international group to do or stop doing something. Covered acts include using explosives, radioactive, biological, chemical, or nuclear materials in a way that causes or is likely to cause death, serious injury, or damage; releasing oil, liquefied natural gas, or other harmful substances in dangerous amounts; hurting or killing anyone during those acts; and attempts or plans to do any of these. A person who makes a clear, serious threat to do these things can be fined, jailed for up to 5 years, or both. The United States can prosecute when the act happens on a fixed platform on the U.S. continental shelf; on another country’s continental shelf if the offender is a U.S. national or a stateless person who lives in the U.S.; if the act was meant to force the U.S. to act; if a U.S. national is seized, threatened, hurt, or killed during the act on a platform on a continental shelf; or if the act occurred on a platform outside the U.S. and beyond the U.S. continental shelf and the offender is later found in the U.S. It does not cover lawful military actions during armed conflict or official acts by a state’s military. “Continental shelf” means the sea floor and under the sea that extend beyond a country’s territorial sea under international law. “Fixed platform” means an artificial island or structure permanently attached to the sea floor for resource work or other economic purposes.