Marina Bai

Marina Bai (born 1965) is a Russian astrologer who sued NASA in July, 2005 for US$300-310 million. She claimed that the Deep Impact NASA probe that crashed into the Tempel 1 comet will interfere with her astrology work because the comet would no longer be the same, claiming it "ruins the natural balance of forces in the universe".

The amount she is suing for is almost as much as the mission cost, and she claims the right to compensation for her "moral sufferings". She stated that the comet has special significance for her family—when her grandparents met, her grandfather pointed out the comet to her future grandmother.

Her case was originally thrown out of a lower court on the ground that Russia had no jurisdiction over NASA, but the ruling was overturned when her lawyer was able to show that NASA's office in the US Embassy in Moscow does fall under Russian jurisdiction.

Marina's case began to be heard in a Moscow court in early September, 2005. Vladimir Fortov, a Russian physicist, said that the collision had no effect on the Earth and that "the change to the orbit of the comet after the collision was only about 10 cm." The case was eventually rejected.