Look out for extra meteorites...

[Tim]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7736996.stm

Would this just get added to the general list of space junk?

[Wobbly Bob]

You would have thougt they would have there tools tethered. We did when working on high steel for two reasons, 1 its a bummer going all the way down to the ground to pick up the tool, 2 a tool dropped from 100ft plus can do some serious damage to some ones head.

The speeds space debris can reach are mind boggling, just imagine a spanner going a gozillion ks, hitting the shuttle, ouch or RIP

[Sam]

They probably only had a 5 pce spanner set from the bargain bin at Homebase in the tool bag (and the grease gun).

[StarLight]

Be funny to see Health and Safety officer flying out to file a report on how to prevent that from happening again and what must be done to correct that!

Are they going to track it or leave it? I'd not want to be on a plane if that came down my way!

StarLight

[661-pete]

I've heard that something as minute as a flake of paint, travelling at orbital speeds, can make a hole in a spacecraft - or an astronaut - or presumably in one of Hubble's mirrors . And the skies are littered with junk from 50 years of spaceflight. I'm not sure that all the satellite trails that I've had across my images are bona fide functioning satellites...

Some day NASA will have to have a bit of a clean-up, before a working and indispensable satellite gets seriously damaged.